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\ 





A HISTORY OF 
THE UNITED STATES 


FOR SCHOOLS 


SUCCESSFUL TEXTS ON 
UNITED STATES HISTORY 

A History of the United States for Schools 

By Andrew C. McLaughlin, Professor of 
History, University of Chicago, and C. H. 
Van Tyne, Professor of History,' University 
of Michigan. With Maps and Illustrations 
For seventh and eighth grade work. One or 
two volume editions. 

A History of the American Nation 

By Andrew C. McLaughlin. With Maps 
and illustrations. For High Schools. 12mo. 
Cloth. 

Readings in the History of the American 
Nation 

By Andrew C. McLaughlin. Source book 
in American history for high schools. 12 mo. 
Cloth. 

D. APPLETON AND COMPANY 
Publishers New York 



A HISTORY OF THE 
UNITED STATES 

FOR SCHOOLS 


BY 

r* 

Andrew c. McLaughlin, a.m., ll.b. 

HEAD OF THE DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY 
UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO 

AND 

CLAUDE HALSTEAD VAN TYNE, Ph.D 

HEAD OF THE DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY 
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN 


WITH MAPS AND ILLUSTRATIONS 



D. APPLETON AND COMPANY 
NEW YORK LONDON 








EL 17% 

./ 

.M / 6 £ 

l<jz 3 


Copyright, 1911, 1915, 1916, 1919, 1923, by 
D. APPLETON AND COMPANY 




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OCT 20-23 


PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 


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PREFACE 


The aim of the authors in writing this book has been to present 
what seemed to them the main historical developments in American 
history, the knowledge of which will enable the pupil to understand 
the social, political, and economic institutions which he finds about 
him in this land wherein he lives. In doing this we have tried to use 
simple language, to show clearly the relation of one fact to another, 
and to keep the story constantly moving forward. We have sought 
to interest not by the selection of the merely entertaining facts 
which are often the things of least value, but by choice of the facts 
that have meant something in our growth as a nation. 

This is first of all a text-book and not a story-book. We make no 
apology for the omission of some material found in the older his¬ 
tories. If history is worth teaching at all, it is worth teaching as 
causal, vital, meaning history. We heartily approve of reading his¬ 
tory for mere pleasure. History is, we believe, in many of its high¬ 
est literary forms, most delightful and valuable “mere reading,” 
but for serious study there are certain essentials which should not be 
disguised or palliated by facts which are only entertaining, and not 
essentially significant. 

We have tried to include only such historical facts and problems 
as may be easily understood by the child of school age, and we have 
intentionally omitted some traditional school-book lore which, in our 
opinion, might well be left to oblivion. Many pupils will never study 
their country’s history again, and there is so much which they, as 
American citizens, ought surely to know, that in a text like this all 
unmeaning events must be sacrificed. By means of this elimination 


v 



vi 


PREFACE 


we have secured space for fuller explanation and interpretation of 
really important events. The literature suggested for reading out¬ 
side of the text will assist in encouraging the pupil to search for and 
to report upon any events or problems which are here omitted, but 
which appear to the teacher to be of interest and importance. We 
are far from sure that we have always chosen our facts wisely and 
are humble enough to be more than tolerant of the differing empha¬ 
sis which any w'ell trained teacher may lay upon the various phases 
of American history. Suggestions, criticisms and corrections will 
be thrice welcome, for only through such friendly cooperation can 
we hope to bring this little book toward the goal of perfection. 

Special acknowledgments of service are due to: Mr. L. A. Chase, In¬ 
structor in History, Houghton, Michigan, High School, who prepared 

i 

the chapter “How Europe Influenced America”; Mr. A. C. Shong 
Principal of the West Division High School, Milwaukee; Mr. A. J 
Gerson, Principal of the Robert Morris Public School, Philadelphia: 
Mr. Gilbert P. Randle, Superintendent of Schools, Danville, Ill.; 
and Miss Edith S. Patten, State Normal School, DeKalb, Ill. 

Acknowledgment is also due to Messrs. Ginn and Company 
for permission to reproduce the relief map on page 23; to 
Mr. R. T. Haines Halsey for permission to reproduce two 
Revolutionary cartoons from his collection; to Professor W. H. 
Siebert for the photograph on page 334, reproduced from his 
“Underground Railroad from Slavery to Freedom” (copyright, 
1898, by the Macmillan Company); to the Lenox Library, New 
York City, for permission to reproduce from many prints; to the Ala¬ 
bama State Department of Archives for the cartoon on page 396; 
and to the Museum of the Peabody Academy of Science for a pho¬ 
tograph of the model of the Constitution that is in their possession. 

This new edition of 1919 contains two altered chapters and a new 
one on the events of the World War. 

Andrew C. McLaughlin. 

Claude Halstead Van Tyne. 


CONTENTS 


PERIOD OF DISCOVERY AND DIVISION OF 
COLONIZING FIELDS 

CHAPTER page 

I.—How the Old World got Ready to Discover the 

New.1 

II.—Columbus Seeks the East and Finds a New 

World.8 

III. —How the People of Europe Came to Know 

What the New World was Like .... 14 

IV. —The Beginnings of Spanish Colonization . . 25 

V.—The Beginnings of French Settlement . . 30 

VI.—The Great English Seamen of the Seventeenth 

Century.. . 36 

PERIOD OF ENGLISH COLONIZATION AND 
STRUGGLE FOR SUPREMACY IN NORTH 

AMERICA 

VII.—The English Colonize Virginia .... 41 

VIII.—The Pilgrims.50 

IX.—The Founding of Massachusetts Bay ... 57 

X.—Rhode Island and Connecticut.—The Confeder¬ 
ation .66 

XI.—New Netherland, Delaware, and New Jersey . 74 

XII.—The Quaker Colony: Pennsylvania ... 84 

XIII. —Other Colonies in the South: Maryland, the 

Carolinas, Georgia.90 

XIV. —The Relations Between England and her 

Colonies.101 

XV.—France and England Struggle for North 

America . .Ill 

XVI.- Life in the Colonies.• 122 

• * 

vu 






Vlll 


CONTENTS 


PERIOD OF POLITICAL REVOLUTION AND 
WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 

CHAPTER PAGE 

XVII. —Causes of the American Revolution . . . 138 

XVIII. —War Begins in New England .... 152 

XIX. —Independence and Confederation . . .161 

XX. —Campaigns Ending in Burgoyne’s Surrender . 168 

XXI. —The French Alliance and Western Conquest. 175 
XXII. —The End of the War . . . . . . 184 


PERIOD OF THE RISE OF A STRONG GOV¬ 
ERNMENT PARTY AND OF REACTION 

XXIII.—How Europe Influenced America (1607-1815) . 195 

XXIV. —Disorder Teaches its Lesson of Danger.— 

The Constitution is Framed and Adopted . 211 

XXV. —The Nation when Washington Became 

President.222 

XXVI. —Starting the New Government.—The Fed¬ 
eralists .231 

XXVII. —Foreign Troubles and Domestic Factions . 243 


PERIOD OF JEFFERSONIAN DEMOCRACY 
AND THE GROWTH OF A TRUE AMERI¬ 
CAN SPIRIT 


XXVIII. —Jeffersonian Democracy and American Ex¬ 
pansion .248 

XXIX. —The Struggle to Secure American Rights 

Without War ....... 254 

XXX.— The War of 1812 ....... 261 

XXXI. —The Westward Movement and the “Monroe 

Doctrine'’.271 

XXXII. —New Parties and the Tariff .... 283 

XXXIII. —The Country in 1830 ...... 290 







CONTENTS 


IX 


PERIOD OF THE RISE OF POLITICAL POWER 
IN THE WEST AND THE ANTISLAVERY 

MOVEMENT 

CHAPTER PAGE 

XXXIV. —Jackson and the Banks.—The Nullifica¬ 
tion Trouble. 299 

XXXV. —Jacksonian Democrats Give Way to the 

Whigs. 307 

XXXVI. —Slavery and Antislavery. 312 

XXXVII. —Texas and the Mexican War. 320 

XXXVIII. —Slavery and the New Territory .... 328 

XXXIX. —Western Settlement and Slavery . . . 336 


PERIOD OF CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 

XL.—Secession.—Civil War Begins.346 

XLI.—Conditions in North and South .... 353 

NLII.—Preparation for War and the Attitude of 

Europe .357 

XLIII.—The Field of War and the Early Campaigns . 362 

XLIV.—Fighting in the West.367 

XLV.—Campaigns of 1863-65 . 373 

XLVI.—Political Crisis.—The End of the War . . 384 

XLVII.—Reconstruction ..390 


RECENT HISTORY AND THE RISE OF GREAT 
INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 

XLVIII. —The Reconstructed Nation.—Its New Prob¬ 
lems . 401 

XLIX. —Party Differences.—Social Unrest . . .411 

L. —The War with Spain. 416 

LI. —Industrial Development: Transportation. 

—The Great West and the New South . 422 

LII. —Industrial Development: Agriculture . . 429 

LIII. —New Industrial Conditions: Political and 

Social Reforms. 436 

LIV. —Recent Political History. 446 

LV. —The United States and the Great War . . 462 

LVI.—The Constitution and Government of the 

• United States. 485 














X 


CONTENTS 


APPENDIX 

PAGE 

Important Dates in United States History . i 

Questions .. vii 

The Presidents and Vice-Presidents .xxviii 

Population and Area of States .xxix 

Territories and Other Political Bodies .... xxix 
Population of Continental United States by Decades . xxx 

The “Mayflower” Compact .xxxi 

The Declaration of Independence ..... xxxii 
Constitution of the United States ..... xxxvi 

INDEX (with Pronunciation of Difficult Proper 

Names) ........... liii 



MAPS 


PAGE 

The World as Known to Europeans at the Middle of the 
15th Century .......... 3 

Old Trade Routes to the East ....... 6 

The Four Voyages of Columbus ....... 12 

The Da Vinci Map (1515 or 1516) ..13 

The Route of Magellan.16 

Early Explorations in the New World.17 

Relief Map of the United States.23 

Early French Discoveries and Settlements .... 30 

French Settlements and Water Routes in the Interior . . 34 

Territory Granted by the Charter of 1606 .... 42 

Land Granted by Charter to the Virginia Company in 1609 . 46 

Rhode Island Settlements.68 

Extent of Settlements in New England in 1660 . . . 71 

European Possessions in 1650 (colored).79 

The Hudson River, Delaware, and Pennsylvania Settlements. 83 

Maryland..92 

The Carolinas and Georgia.100 

The Dominion of New England under Andros .... 107 

Relief Map of the Northeastern Colonies.Ill 

Relief Map of the Southern Colonies.112 

European Claims before 1755 (colored) . . . facing 116 

The French and Indian War, Western Campaigns . . .118 

The French and Indian War, Northern and Eastern Cam¬ 
paigns .119 

Colonial Governments Distinguished (colored) . . . 131 

Central North America 1763-1783 (colored) . . facing 144 

Boston and its Vicinity in 1776 . 155 

The Early Campaigns of the Revolution . 172 

Lafayette.176 


XI 








Xll 


MAPS 


PAGE 

Clark’s Campaign in the West.182 

The Campaigns in the South, War of the Revolution . . 191 

The United States at the End of the Revolutionary War 
(colored) ........... 192 

The Northwest Territory.. . .216 

Distribution of the Population in 1790 . 223 

Routes from Philadelphia and Virginia to Pittsburg and the 

Ohio.229 

Map Showing Spanish Control of the Mouth of the Mississippi 242 
Central North America after the Louisiana Purchase 

(colored). facing 250 

Routes of Lewis and Clark and Pike.252 

Field of Campaigns in the West, War of 1812 . . . . 263 

Field of Campaigns in the North and East, War of 1812 . 267 

The Region about Washington and Baltimore .... 268 

The Cumberland Road.276 

The Erie Canal.277 

Free and Slave Areas after 1820 . 280 

Map of the Election of 1824 . 286 

Distribution of the Population in 1830 . 291 

Field of the War with Mexico.324 

The Oregon Country.326 

Acquisition of Territory in the West.327 

Chart Showing Increase of Immigration by Decades . . 338 

Map of the Election of 1860. 347 

Charleston Harbor.351 

The United States in 1861 (colored) .... facing 352 

Railroads in the United States in 1860 . 355 

The Relation of Nassau to the Blockaded Ports of the South . 360 

The United States East of the Mississippi.362 

Field of the Eastern Campaigns of the Civil War . . . 366 

Field of the Western Campaigns of the Civil War . . . 369 

Historical Sketch of the Civil War.379 

Field of the Last Campaigns of the Civil War and the Line of 

Sherman’s March.382 

Map of the Election of 1876 . 401 







MAPS 


xm 


PAGE 

Map of the Election of 1896 . 415 

Field of the Campaigns in Cuba . . . -_ - . . 419 

Territorial Growth of the United States (colored) . facing 422 

Trails to the West and Routes of Pacific Railroads . . . 425 

The World, Showing the United States and its Dependencies 
and the Changes that Will be Effected in the World’s 

Trade Routes by the Panama Canal.449 

Distribution of the Population in 1910.451 

Map of the Election of 1912.457 

Western and Eastern Battle Fronts.465 

Electoral Vote and States carried by Wilson and Hughes, 


1916. . 473 


f 







A 

HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES 

FOR SCHOOLS 


i 

PERIOD OF DISCOVERY AND DIVISION OF 
COLONIZING FIELDS 


CHAPTER I 

HOW THE OLD WORLD GOT READY TO DISCOVER 

THE NEW 

1. Ignorance of Geography Five Hundred Years Ago.— 

Five hundred years ago the wisest men of Europe knew less 
about the geography of the earth than is now known by the 
schoolboy. They knew little more than was known by 
the geographer who lived in the days of the Apostle Paul. 
The Mediterranean * 1 Sea was still the center of the world’s 
business and interest as it had been fifteen hundred years 
before. The outline of Europe was fairly well known, but 
of Africa, stretching away to the southward into the tropics 
and beyond, little was known save the northern coast. Men 
still relied on the map of Ptolemy, a geographer of the second 
century, who had merely guessed at the shape and size of 
the great southern continent. Australia and America had 
never been heard of, and Asia was a land of great empires, 
still largely a land of myth and fancy, with an outline on the 
maps that we could hardly recognize to-day. 

2. Fear of the Great Sea. —These three parts of the world 
—Europe, Asia, and Africa—vaguely known even to the 

1 Mediterranean means “the middle of the earth.” 

1 





2 PERIOD OF DISCOVERY 

learned, were thought to be encircled by a vase mysterious 
sea—“ the Sea of Darkness,” as men called it five hundred 
years ago. Ships dared not venture far out upon its wa¬ 
ters, for it was 
supposed to be 
haunted by dan¬ 
gerous monsters 
of the deep; and 
out far away, 
the fearsome sail¬ 
ors thought, lay 
the edge of the 
world, where the 
sea grew gum- 
like and sluggish, 
and the water 
became heavy against the oar, where no waves were raised 
by the wind, and where even to breathe the air was 
impossible. 

3. A Flat Earth. —Some of the wiser men of early days had 
believed that the earth is round, but in the fifteenth century, 
the time of which we are speaking, this belief in a round world 
was confined to a very few men of learning; the sailors and 
men of everyday business were largely ruled by these fanci¬ 
ful notions, by these mysteries of an unknown earth and the 
terrors of an unknown sea. To make voyages far out to the 
westward on this terrible Sea of Darkness seemed beyond 
human powers. Though men at the beginning of the 
fifteenth century knew little of the big world, and though 
their notions of geography were not much truer than 
those held a thousand years before, new ideas were soon 
to come. 

4. The Crusaders. —To understand these changes and this 
new impulse we must know something about things which 
had been happening during several hundred years before 
the fifteenth century. These things had been altering the 



Terrors of the Sea of Darkness 
As pictured by a sixteenth century illustrator. 

























CHANGES IN THE OLD WORLD 3 

way men lived and even the way they thought. In the 
ninth century hordes of barbarous Turks took possession 
ot large parts of Asia Minor and seized upon the places in 
Palestine that were sacred to the Christians of Europe. 
Army after army was sent from Europe to fight the Turks 
in the Holy Land and to regain the sacred places from their 
hands. These crusades, 1 as the wars were called, these two 
hundred years (1096 to 1300) of effort to conquer the Turks, 
awakened new interest in the East and increased the desire 
for Eastern goods. Men were more eager than ever for the 
pearls and ivory, the perfumes and the spices, silks and beau- 



The World as Known to Europeans at the Middle of the 15th 

Century 

tiful cashmere shawls which traders brought out of the 
“ Golden East.” 

5. Tales of the Far East. —In the two centuries after 
the Crusades (1096-1300), trade with Asia was brisk and 
vigorous. Europe was coming to be more and more depend¬ 
ent on the spices and other commodities of the East. There 
came, too, at this time, new tales of the wealth and wonders 
of Asia. Marco Polo, an Italian who had spent nearly 
thirty years in the Far East, returning to Europe, wrote a 
book telling marvelous stories of Cathay, or China, and 
Cipangu, or Japan. The King of Japan, he said, lived in 


1 Crusade, “a war for the cross,” from Latin crux, a cross. 








4 


PERIOD OF DISCOVERY 


a palace roofed with gold ; 1 the floor was of slabs of gold 
two fingers thick. Another book, “ The Travels of Sir John 
Mandeville,” much more widely read, was filled with fanciful 
and weird stories. It told of golden birds that clapped their 
wings by magic, of golden vines laden with costly jewels, 
of a fountain of youth where one might drink and be forever 
young. 

6. New Interests.—With such tales as these, the longing 
for the wealth and wonders of the East grew stronger. The 
minds of men were preparing for great tasks that were to 
change the world. The Crusades had stirred the thoughts 
of men as never before. In the Dark Ages 2 the common 
man had tilled the soil in ignorance; the nobleman or the 
knight amused himself in his castle or led his followers to 
battle; book learning was largely confined to a few men, and 
they often spent their days in considering what seem to us 
strange questions, such as: “How many angels can stand on 
the point of a needle?” and “Is it a greater crime to kill a 
thousand men than to mend a beggar’s shoe on Sunday?” 
But now learned men began to talk and think of things more 
full of meaning for practical ends. 

7. Discovery and Inventions.—One man, the great Coper¬ 
nicus, had begun the studies which led him to discover that 
the earth on which he stood was a vast planet whirling 
in space with other planets about the sun. Another in¬ 
vented the art of printing by movable blocks, and hence¬ 
forward it was not necessary to write laboriously by hand 
each copy of a book, for many might be printed at little 
cost. A few skilled hands also left off making curious orna¬ 
ments for church furniture or for the armor of knights, and 
turned their attention to perfecting instruments that told the 
sailor his whereabouts at sea, or to the improvement of 

1 “ The Travels of Marco Polo ” appears on the whole to be a truthful 
account of what he had himself seen. Of Japan he knew only from the 
tales of others. 

2 As the centuries before the Crusades were called. 



CHANGES IN THE OLD WORLD 


5 



paper, on which books could be printed and letters written. 
Gunpowder was coming into use, and this meant a new kind 
of warfare; bows and 
arrows and spears 
gave way to guns 
and cannon . 1 

8. The Turks Block 
the Way to the East. 

—At the end of the 
fourteenth century 
there came a new 
need for exploration 
and discovery. The 
result of the Cru¬ 
sades had been not 
only to awaken new 
interest in the East, 
but to hold back, 
for a time, the spread 
of the Turks. The 


Italian cities, espe- A N Early Printing Shop 

cially Genoa and 

Venice, carried on a thriving trade with Asia. But in the 
fourteenth century the Ottoman Turks, the same race that 
now holds Constantinople, came into the region of the trade 
routes 2 and began slowly to spread over wide areas in 


1 Against the cannon the armor of the knight did not give him safety, 
nor were even his castle walls secure, as they had been against the 
epears and arrows. A simple farmer with a gun could now kill the 
greatest lord clad in armor. The king of the land, aided by workmen 
and tradesmen, could beat down the castles of the knights and extend 
the royal power. The kings of Portugal, Spain, France, and England, 
for this reason as well as for others, became rich and powerful. Thus 
they were able to give aid to brave and earnest men who wished to 
explore the earth and who had neither money nor ships for the purpose. 

2 These routes led from India and China through the Black Sea, the 
Persian Gulf, and the Red Sea to Venice and Genoa. See map on page 6. 














































































6 


PERIOD OF DISCOVERY 


Europe and Asia . 1 The routes from Europe to India and 
China were blocked, and though traffic was not altogether 
broken up, there was danger that in time Europe would 
be completely cut off from the Far East. 

9. Henry the Navigator.—In the face of these dangers, 
the enterprising men of Europe were not idle. The new 



Over these routes with boat and caravan the Europeans had traveled for 
centuries in search of the silks, spices, and other treasures of the East. 

conditions, of which we have spoken, the zeal for a wider 
and better knowledge of the world, were making themselves 
felt, and men were turning to new tasks. Among the famous 
men of the day was the son of the King of Portugal, now 
known as Prince Henry, the Navigator, tie gathered about 
him bold sailors and trained them well; he helped them 
to learn the arts they needed. He taught them to trust 
the devices which made it safe to sail the seas where there 
is no other guide than the sun and stars. He helped 
them to rely on the astrolabe and on the compass, the 


1 They gradually spread westward and took Constantinople in 1453. 












CHANGES IN THE OLD WORLD 


7 



An Early Compass 


wonderful needle which always tries to point toward the 
north. Under his guidance, and moved by his courageous 
spirit, mariners made long voyages 
down the coast of Africa, pressing ever 
farther southward. Not in his life¬ 
time did his captains pass the southern 
point of the continent; but soon after 
his death, Diaz, more steadfast than 
the rest, rounded the Cape of Good 
Hope (1486), and a decade later Vasco 
da Gama, starting in 1497, passing the 
Cape, pushed northward and sailed 
into a harbor on the coast of India. 

The Portuguese could justly boast that 
“ new lands, new seas, new worlds, 
even new constellations have been dragged from darkness 
into the light of day.” 

10. The Great Work of the Portuguese. —The most im¬ 
portant result of Henry’s work was 
to banish imaginary terrors of the 
deep and to train up a body of sea¬ 
men who dared to sail the ocean 
even beyond the sight of land. 
Henry’s sailors proved that there 
was no flaming zone at the equator, 
as men had imagined, barring the 
wav to the south. Even the Sea of 
Darkness did not seem so pitiless 
and terrible as men had fancied for 



This is the instrument that 
was used by navigators, 
at the time of Columbus, 
to obtain altitudes of the 
sun and stars above the 
horizon. 


ages. 


11. To Find the East by Sailing 
West. —As we have seen, the marin¬ 
ers of Portugal sought the way to 
the East by sailing southward, and before 1500 they found 
the way to India by sea around the south of Africa. But 
before this southern way to India was found, yet more 


















8 


PERIOD OF DISCOVERY 


wonderful voyages had been made. We have seen how 
Europe had long stood with her back to the Atlantic look¬ 
ing with greedy eyes toward Asia, until the Turks seized 
the trade routes thither. Now, under the leadership of a 
daring man, attempts were to be made to reach the coveted 
riches of the East by sailing westward out into the wide 
Atlantic, and around the earth to Asia. The Turks might 
bar the routes eastward to India and China, but the way 
westward still lay open if only men were brave and wise 
enough to turn that way. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: (Crusades and Marco Polo) Fiske, Discovery of Ame /• 
ica, I, 270-276, 280-284. Brooks, Story of Marco Polo. (Da Gama) 
Hale, Stories of Discovery, 34-58. Higginson, American Explorers . 

Sources: (Marco Polo) Old South Leaflets, No. 32. 


CHAPTER II 

COLUMBUS SEEKS THE EAST AND FINDS A NEW WORLD 

12. Christopher Columbus.—The man who was to try the 

great feat of discovering the East by sailing westward was 
Christopher Columbus, an Italian. Born in Genoa, the son 
of a poor wool weaver, he had gone to sea at an early age 
and had learned the art of navigation. In some way, too, 
he had studied Latin, for he could read the learned books of 
the day. Travels and geography pleased him most, and we 
know that he pored over volumes that told of the strange 
lands of the world. It was in Portugal, his son tells us, that 
Columbus first began to think that, if men could sail so far 
southward, they might sail westward and find China and 
India in the western ocean. 1 From “ The Travels of Marco 

1 Vignaud, an eminent investigator, does not believe this. Not until 
after Columbus’ second voyage, says Vignaud, did he think he had 
reached the Indies, and at first he set out merely to find new islands 
and new lands. For the present we choose to keep the old story. 



COLUMBUS FINDS A NEW WORLD 


9 


Polo” he learned that there was a sea east of China, and in 
another book, called “ The Picture of the World,” he read 
that “ between the end of Spain and the beginning of India 
the sea is small and can be sailed over in a few days.” 
W ise men had believed for ages that the world is round, 
and Columbus accepted this belief. He had himself sailed 
into the north and as far 
south as Guinea, and 
had seen proofs 1 that the 
earth is round. 

13. Tales of the West¬ 
ern Ocean.—Stories of 
lands in the western 
ocean had long been 
told, and these mav have 
strongly influenced Co¬ 
lumbus as he bent over 
his books on geography 
or heard the accounts of 
Portuguese discoveries 
on the coast of Africa. 

It is at least not unlike¬ 
ly that, in times past, 
storm-driven vessels had 
actually touched lands 
on the western side of the Atlantic; but in those early days, 
when there was no printing, the tales of poor and obscure 
sailors, even if believed when first reported, were soon for¬ 
gotten. In fact, we now know that nearly five hundred 
years before the time of Columbus, a Norse sailor, Leif, son 
of Eric the Red, sailed southward from Greenland and found 
the coast of a new land, which he called “ Vinland the 
good,” for he found grapes there. This land where grapes 
grew was doubtless North America; but the discovery of the 
new continent made little or no impression on the world of the 



1 Some of the proofs which you find mentioned in your geographies. 













10 


PERIOD OF DISCOVERY 



year 1000, and, though the story was told and retold from 
father to son in far-away Iceland, Columbus probably never 
heard of Vinland or the adventurous voyages of the Northmen. 

14. A Voyage to the West.—When Columbus put together 
the ideas of a round earth, a narrow sea between China and 
Europe, and the rumors of lands seen by storm-driven 

sailors, he was sure he 
could sail west from 
Spain and reach the 
marvelous Indies. He 
failed, however, even 
with sayings of great 
geographers and 
travelers, to convince 
the King of Portugal, 
of whom he first 
asked aid; but after 
long years of perse¬ 
verance in his search 
for help, he won the 
interest of Queen 
Isabella of Spain. In 
hope that Columbus 
would bring back the 
gold and other treas¬ 
ures of the East, a 
royal order was issued 
to the people of Pa¬ 
los, a seaport of Spain, to provide two ships and wages for 
the crews to undertake the new and perilous voyage. Three 
vessels 1 were at last secured and manned with such seamen 
as could be hired or forced to enter on what seemed a 
foolhardy venture. In August, 1492, the little fleet set sail 
for the Canary Islands, and thence went out upon the track¬ 
less waters of the Sea of Darkness. 


Columbus’ Flag Ship, the Santa Maria 

This picture is of the model sent over by 
Spain to the Columbian Exposition in 
Chicago, in 1893. 


1 Pinta, Santa Maria , and Nina were the names. 













































COLUMBUS FINDS A NEW WORLD 


11 


15. On the Sea of Darkness.—The ships were small and 
not very trustworthy for ocean travel; the dangers to be 
met seemed great and fearful because they were unknown. 
The sailors were frightened from the first; and, as the days 
w^ent by and no land appeared, they grumbled and threatened 
until only with difficulty could Columbus persuade them to 
go on. He told them “ it was useless to complain, as he had 
come to go to the Indies, and he would keep on till he found 
them, with the aid of our Lord.” It was this faith and 
courage that won the day. After more than a month of 
westward sailing, signs of land began to appear—a tuft of 
grass, a piece of wood that some man had carved, land 
birds flying over the ship. 

16. Land Discovered.—On the morning of October 12, 
1492, land itself was seen. It proved to be a small coral 
island of the Bahamas, and Columbus claimed it for the 
King and Queen of Spain, naming it San Salvador. He 
naturally supposed it was an outlying island near the coast 
of Asia. The naked, copper-colored natives, their bodies 
painted black and white and red, hardly tallied with Marc r 
Polo’s pictures of the silken-garbed Chinese and Japanese: 
but Columbus, believing himself near India, a name then 
loosely applied to the whole East, called the people Indians. 

When he heard of Cuba, he believed that it was Japan, 
and that not far away were the great cities of China, one 
with its twelve thousand stone bridges and one with its 
hundred pepper ships a year, as Marco Polo had described 
them. When he sailed to the coast of Cuba, he believed he 
had found the mainland, but when he sought the Great 
Khan, the mighty Eastern emperor, he found only a village 
of naked barbarians. The only thing the natives could do 
for the white strangers was to teach them “ to draw smoke 
from the leaves of a plant rolled into a tube and lighted at¬ 
one end.” These tubes were called “ tobaccos.” 

17. Columbus Believed He Had Found Asia.—Columbus 
expected to find gold, precious stones, perfumes, valuable 


12 


PERIOD OF DISCOVERY 


woods, and rich fabrics; and though he did not find them, he 
did not yield to discouragement or think he had not found 
the Golden East. He sailed to another island, Haiti, which 
he called La Isla Espanola, “ the Spanish Island, 7 ’ and there 
he saw again, not riches or the palaces of China but only 
swarms of naked savages. He had the misfortune to lose 



The Four Voyages of Columbus 
This map shows how much of the New World was visited by its discoverer. 


one of his ships, and as another was unseaworthy, he left 
part of his men on the island and sailed back to Spain. 

18. His Success Proclaimed in Europe.—Upon the re¬ 
turn of Columbus after a stormy voyage, he was received 
with great joy and pomp by the Spanish king and queen. 
The tale of his discovery was heralded far and wide. One 
of his letters, telling the story, was printed in different coun¬ 
tries and circulated throughout Europe within a year—for 
now, with the aid of printing, a great achievement could 
easily be made known. Tales of new and strange sights 
greatly interested men, but they were chiefly pleased be- 































COLUMBUS FINDS A NEW WORLD 13 

cause they believed that Columbus had found a new way to 
the treasures of the East. 

19. Disappointment.—Columbus went on three more 
voyages, but search as he might, he could not find the 
wealth of Asia or the marvelous cities of China. Little by 
little his reputation as a great discoverer departed, and 
after his return from his fourth voyage he lived in obscurity 



The Da Vinci Map (1515 or 1516) 

One of the earliest maps on which the word “America” appeared. 


and died almost unnoticed. We know that he had found a 
new world and had won undying fame; he himself believed 
to the end that he had reached the Orient, and he died in 
disappointment because he had not found the riches and 
the splendors he had expected. 

20. Amerigo Vespucci.—Why the new world was not 
named after Columbus is a curious story. Among the many 









14 


PERIOD OF DISCOVERY 


explorers who hastened thither was Amerigo Vespucci. He 
wrote about his voyage along the South American coast, 
and said the land was a “ New World —not meaning that 
it was a part detached from Asia, but that it was not the 
part formerly known. Columbus never claimed to have 
found anything but the Indies—a part of Asia. Therefore, 
when the account of Amerigo or Americus came to a certain 
teacher of geography who was printing a book with a map 
showing this new part of the world, it seemed right to him 
to call the new land America. Later many map makers 
placed this name on South America, though they were still 
uncertain as to whether it was part of Asia. Everybody 
came in time to call it America. Hence, with no ill inten¬ 
tion, Columbus was robbed of the glory of having the new 
world named after him. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: Wright, Stories of American History, (Columbus) 38- 
GO, (Norsemen) 27-37. (Columbus) J. Lang, Children's Heroes 
Series; F. A. Ober, Columbus, the Discoverer; McMurry, Pioneers 
on Land and, Sea; T. B. Lawler, The Story of Columbus and Magel¬ 
lan; Brooks, The True Story of Christopher Columbus. 

Sources: Hart, American History Told by Contemporaries, I, No. 
16. Old South Leaflets, No. 31. American History Leaflets, No. 3. 

Fiction: Longfellow, Skeleton in Armor. 


CHAPTER III 

HOW THE PEOPLE OF EUROPE CAME TO KNOW WHAT 
THE NEW WORLD WAS LIKE 

21. The New World Gradually “ Uncovered.’’—We must 
not think that as soon as Columbus had discovered the New 
World, men knew all about this strange land. Only gradually 
was it “ uncovered ” by the journeys of daring men who 
were bold enough to sail across the sea, and afterwards de¬ 
scribed what they found there. Let us see how Spanish and 
French explorers made the new world known. 


LEARNING TO KNOW THE NEW WORLD 


15 


22. Stories of Riches.—'When the new land was dis¬ 
covered, men had at first no great wish to go there to live. 
So little were the dreams of riches realized in the early 
years, that the disappointed Spaniards nicknamed Columbus 
“ Admiral of Mosquito Land.” But soon stories came back 
of great riches to be found which tempted men to go and seek 
their fortunes. One Spanish explorer reported that while ex¬ 
ploring in the newly discovered land he had been rowed in a 
native canoe the paddle handles of which were inlaid with 
pearls. The Indians of the Bahamas told the Spaniards of a 
land to the north where might be found a spring or river whose 
waters would make an old man young. These stories and 
the Spaniards’ desire to get rich without labor, drew many 
men to America, looking ever for waters floored with pearls, 
mines of metals, and fountains of eternal youth. The chief 
result of this search for fortune was to teach the Europeans 
much of the geography of America. 

23. Balboa Beholds the Pacific.—The guess of Vespucci 
that South America was a new part of the world was made 
more certain when, in 1513, Balboa, a Spaniard fleeing from 
his debts, led a small party through the dense tangle of the 
forests to the high ridge of the Panama isthmus and saw to 
the south the mighty Pacific, which he called the South Sea. 
But it was not until 1522 that Europe learned of a fact 
which should have made it sure that America was a new 
world, far to the east of the Indies. In that year returned 
one of the ships with which Ferdinand Magellan had set out 
in 1519 to find a passage south of America to the Indian 
Spice Islands. 

24. Magellan Sails around the World.—Magellan had 
sailed from Spain to the South American coast, along that 
to the straits now named after him, and through them to 
the vast ocean which he called the Pacific, because of the 
quiet waters and fair winds which favored him. He at last 
reached the Philippine Islands and was there killed by the 
natives, but one of his ships went on around Africa and back 


16 


PERIOD OF DISCOVERY 


to Spain. That the world was round was now proven by the 
act of sailing around it. Magellan’s courage in sailing over 
an utterly unknown ocean twice as wide as the Atlantic, in 
the face of terrifying dangers, has made historians rank him 



as the greatest navigator of all time, and his voyage the 
greatest deed of man upon the sea. 

25. The Land of Flowers.—One of the first explorations 
in what is now the United States was made by Ponce de 
Leon, a brave Spanish officer. The King of Spain gave 
him a charter (1512) to colonize and rule a certain island 
north of the Bahamas. De Leon was tempted thither 
in part because the “fountain of youth” was thought to 
be in some island there. The old warrior neared the shores 
of a new land, which looked so fair with its mass of green 
foliage, that he named it Florida in honor of the Easter 
season 1 in which he found it. Thinking it an island, he 
sailed around its southern end and along its western coast. 
When he failed to find the youth-restoring waters or the 
island his charter described, he returned and got a new 
patent to colonize the “ island ” of Florida. On his coming 
again to the flowery shores, he was wounded in a fight with 
the Indians. He returned to Cuba to die, and there, as 

‘The Spanish for Easter season is Pascua Florida, or “Flowering 
Easter.” 















Early Explorations in the New World 



























18 


PERIOD OF DISCOVERY 


the Spanish epitaph reads, repose “ the bones c the valiant 
Lion whose deeds surpass the greatness c " name.” 

26. Voyages Along the Eastern Coast.— vVhen once the 
Spaniards had touched the southern coast of what is now 
the United States, they soon learned the outline of the eastern 
and southern shores of the continent. Already, John Cabot, 
sailing in 1497, with the permission of Henry VII., King of 
England, had come upon the eastern coast of America, north 
of Nova Scotia. Pineda tried all the way from Florida to 
Mexico to get through the great wall of the continent to the 
spices and jewels of India. Gomez, another Spaniard, sailed 
along the whole eastern coast of the present United States. 

27. Earliest Spanish Colonization in the South.—In this 
way the Spaniards traced out the long coast of North Amer¬ 
ica from Newfoundland to Mexico. The expedition of 
Gomez added much to European knowledge of American 
geography, but no settlements were made, for the ex¬ 
plorers were disappointed in not finding riches. In the 
south the eager gold hunter met better fortune. Cortes, a 
Spanish adventurer, conquered Mexico (1519-1521), a great 
empire rich in precious metals; and Pizarro (1531), seized 
the treasures of the Peruvians. Thus Spanish enterprise was 
in large measure called away to the southward. In the islands 
of the Caribbean, in Mexico, and in Peru they founded an 
immense and profitable empire. 

28. Narvaez and Cabega de Vaca.—As great glory and 
riches had come to Cortes from his conquest of Mexico, 
another Spanish adventurer, Narvaez, hoped to find like 
fortune in the country north of the Gulf of Mexico. He 
set out with five ships and six hundred people, and on 
Good Friday, 1528, landed near Tampa Bay, Florida. 
Eight years later four survivors of this ill-fated expedition 
appeared on the west coast of Mexico, sixteen hundred 
miles distant from the starting point. Cabega de Vaca. one 
of the four who lived through those terrible years, has told 
the story of their wanderings. The little army was early 


LEARNING TO KNOW THE NEW WORLD 


19 


cut in twain. Finally, when all save fifteen of De Vaca’s 
band had perished, they fell in with Indians who made them 
medicine men. 1 Three thousand people occasionally fol¬ 
lowed them at a time. They had to breathe upon and bless 
the food and drink of each, and were bothered to death 
giving permission to the natives to do what they asked to 
do, often most foolish and simple things. As healers, 
traders, or slaves they passed five weary years. When at 
last the four survivors were again among Spaniards, Cabega 
declared that “ Florida was the richest country of the 
world.” He thus roused false hopes which led to famous 
adventures and explorations. 

29. De Soto.—Hernando de Soto next tried to find the 
land of gold. He landed at Tampa Bay (May, 1539) with 
a small army of men and horses, 2 toiled along the marshy 
coast of Florida to Apalache, and wintered there. Then, in 
the spring, he marched' to the north, and for two years and 
more wandered about, but found nowhere gold and silver 
and precious stones. Two years from the time of starting 
he came upon the “ great river.” “ If a man stood still on 
the other side, it could not be discerned whether he were a 
man or not,” said one wtio related these adventures. “ There 
came down the river continually many trees and timber.” 
It was the Mississippi, the great river, which, with its tribu¬ 
tary streams, drains the central basin of the new comment. 
Back and forth many times across this river De Soto went, 
searching for some rich land like Peru or Mexico. At last, 
when his army was much reduced, he fell sick and died. 
Wrapped in mantles filled with sand, his body was thrown 
into the river which he had discovered. 

After many more trials and difficulties, the surviving 
men, barely one half of those that started, managed to reach 
Mexico, four years and a summer after the time of their 

1 Indian doctors. 

2 Six hundred and twenty men and two hundred and twenty-three 
horses. 



20 PERIOD OF DISCOVERY 

departure. The greatest reward of this toil and suffering 
was the finding of the mighty stream which rolls for 
nearly three thousand miles through the heart of our con¬ 
tinent and drains one of the richest regions of the earth. 

30. Coronado and the Great Southwest.—While De Soto 
was in the Mississippi Valley, Coronado was making a like 
search in what we now call the great Southwest—Arizona, 
New Mexico, and Colorado. The Spaniards of Mexico re- 



The Cave Dwellings of Puye 
T he kind of homes that Coronado found in the Southwest. 

me/nbered an old legend of Seven Cities, said to be on an 
island in the Atlantic. Thinking that this county which 
they so vaguely knew might be the island, the ruler of New 
Spain sent a friar, Marcos by name, to explore. He re¬ 
turned frightened but filled with stories of a great city 
which he had seen from afar off. Francisco de Coronado 
now set out with some three hundred Spaniards and eight 
hundred Indians to conquer the golden empire that seemed 
to lie in the region north of Mexico (1540). 

31. Indians and Buffaloes but no Seven Cities.—Coronado 
must have been a very strange sight with his gilded arms and 












LEARNING TO KNOW THE NEW WORLD 21 

with a waving plume, on the headpiece of his armor as he 
led his foot soldiers and friars and cavaliers across the 
plains, through the mountain defiles, and into the rude 
villages of the natives; for although he was lured on by 
stories of canoes with golden eagles on their prows, and of a 
great lord who took his nap under a tree hung with little 
golden bells that made drowsy music as they swung in the 
air, he found only wandering savages, or, at best, Indians 
who lived in queer mud houses called pueblos. Many 
strange things were seen, especially the immense herds of 
buffaloes, “ such a multitude that they are numberless.” 
Amidst the savage tribes Coronado wandered, coming upon 
the Grand Canyon of the Colorado and other natural won¬ 
ders, but no rich cities or lands of gold. 

32. The Spaniards Come to Know America.—Neither 
De Soto nor Coronado found the riches he sought, but 
their journeys were not useless or fruitless. Much was 
learned about the geography of a large part of what is now 
our country, and the stories of their perilous journeys 
helped to make the men of Europe acquainted with the new 
world. 

33. French Explorers.—While these Spaniards were ex¬ 
ploring the southern part of what is now the United States, 
the French king, the hated rival of the Spanish king, sent 
his own explorers to America. French fishermen had 
already begun to come in little fleets of boats to fish for cod 
off the coast of Newfoundland. In 1534 Cartier, a French 
sailor, entered the Gulf of St. Lawrence. The following 
year, tempted by the hope of reaching India, he sailed up 
the river to the cliffs that were later crowned by the city of 
Quebec, and then pushed on to Montreal. Returning to 
Quebec, he there passed the winter. Those who survived the 
cold and sickness returned to France in the spring. 

As the French learned later, Cartier had discovered the 
great northern gateway to the Mississippi Valley and the 
region of the Great Lakes. Almost at once the French king 


22 


PERIOD OF DISCOVERY 


claimed the land round about the St. Lawrence River, 
but the discovery really unfolded far greater possibilities. 
Nearly a million square miles of land, lying between the 
Alleghanies and the Rocky Mountains, and rich in nearly 
everything that civilized man desires, lay open to the French 
if the}' would but follow that river to the Great Lakes, and 
thence make easy portages to the tributaries of the Mis¬ 
sissippi River. 

34. The Great Continent to Be Settled.—Thus, before the 
middle of the sixteenth century the coast of America was 
fairly well explored, though men, long after that, hoped they 
could find a way through it to the East they longed to 
reach. Of the interior of the continent something was now 
known. It was found to be of vast extent, with wide rivers 
and extensive forests. East of the Mississippi most of the 
country was covered with heavy woods; in the west were 
great plains stretching away to the foothills of the then 
unknown mountains—the same long range that passed down 
through Mexico and along near the western coast of South 
America. The Mississippi Valley, though not rich in the 
treasures which the Spaniards looked for, was a beautiful and 
fertile country, destined to be the center of a powerful 
empire. 

35. The Indians.—The land was but thinly populated. 
The Indians, as the natives were called because the early 
explorers believed that 
they had found India, were 
copper-colored, had high 
cheek bones, small eyes, 

and coarse black hair. 

...... „ Indian Stone Ax 

they lived in houses of 

bark or of skins stretched on poles. In the great Southwest 
they lived in large mud or adobe houses. Their clothing was 
of skins or furs. They made tools of stone, shells, bones, or 
deer horns. They navigated the streams and lakes with 
canoes cleverly made of bark or from a single log that was 















Relief Map of the United States 
Copyright, 1895, by A. E. Frye 






24 


PERIOD OF DISCOVERY 


hollowed out with fire. In a rude and simple way they raised 
maize, or Indian corn, as we call it. For ornaments they 
wore beads, feathers, animals’ teeth and claws, and they 
stained their faces. They lived in villages, were divided 

into widely sepa¬ 
rated tribes, were 
governed in peace 
by leaders called 
sachems and led 
by chiefs in war. 
They delighted in 
fighting, and, like 
all savages, took 
joy in torturing 
their enemies. 

36. The Bar¬ 
riers to the White 
Man’s Advance. 
—In the peopling 
of this new land 
the white men 
met two difficul¬ 
ties : first, the natural barriers—the mountains and the forests; 
second, the Indians who owned the lands and who naturally 
objected when the white man entered the country and acted 
as if the land were his. The story of this battle with the 
forests, the mountains, and the Indians is an important part 
of our history. But for that struggle, of which we shall hear 
much as our story advances, Americans would have been 
more like Europeans than they are, for the America of to-day 
is peopled, for the most part, by men and women whose fore¬ 
fathers came from Europe. 



Strings of 
Wampum 


Indian War 
Club 


Indian Calumet 
or Peace Pipe 


Suggested Readings 

Histories: (Cartier) Parkman, Pioneers of France, 210-227. (Ma¬ 
gellan) Hale, Stories of Discovery, 59-85. Fiske, Discovery of 











THE BEGINNINGS OF SPANISH COLONIZATION 25 


America, II, (Magellan) 184, 188-189, 190-207, (Cortes) 245-255, 
(Pizarro) 391-408, (De Soto) 390, 398, 509. Starr, American In¬ 
dians. Judd, Wigwam Stories. Ober, (1) Cortes, Conqueror of 
Mexico, (2) Ferdinand De Soto and the Invasion of Florida, (3) 
Balboa, (4) Juan Ponce de Leon, (5) Magellan. McMurry, Pioneers 
on Land and Sea. Winterburn, The Spanish in the Southwest. But- 
terworth, Story of Magellan. Griffis, Romance of Discovery. 

Sources: Hart, Source Booh, 6-8, 9—11. American History Leaf¬ 
lets, No. 13. Old South Leaflets, I, Nos. 17, 20; II, Nos. 34, 35, 36, 
39. Hart, American History Told by Contemporaries, I, Nos. 21, 
22, 23, 24, 25. King, De Soto in the Land of the Floridas. 


CHAPTER IV 

THE BEGINNINGS OF SPANISH COLONIZATION 

37. Why Men Came to the New World.—We have al¬ 
ready seen that a desire to know the world and its resources 
had led to many important discoveries; but if men were to 
leave Europe, the old world, and move to the new, there 
must be some strong reason—either a hard, wretched life 
at home or golden prospects abroad. If there were so many 
people in the old country that there was not enough work 
and food for all, or if some men persecuted others, the 
persons who could not live in comfort would go to the new 
land if they were able. Thus, as we shall see, it was the 
hope of betterment, of getting on in the world, that brought 
men across the Atlantic to the new continent. 

38. Religious Disputes in Europe.—In considering the 
settlement of America we must know that in the old world 
there were disputes and differences about religion. Through¬ 
out the Middle Ages there had been one Church in west¬ 
ern Europe, and all people belonged to that Church and ac¬ 
cepted its doctrine. The Pope was the head of the Church 
and no one denied his leadership. But soon after the dis¬ 
covery of America, when so many new things were being done 
and so many old opinions about the world were changing, 
there came to pass what is called the Reformation, or some- 


26 


PERIOD OF DISCOVERY 


times the “ Protestant Revolt.” 1 A great discussion arose 
between the followers of the Pope and the Protestants, as 
those were called that protested against things they did not 
believe or like. The struggle spread from one country to 
another, and soon the whole of Europe was discussing re¬ 
ligion—often with much ill feeling. For a hundred years and 
more religious disputes and frequent wars occupied in large 
measure the interest and energy of the people of Europe. 

39. Spain First in the New World.—Spain was not so 
much distracted and disturbed by the ill feeling and dis¬ 
putes in religion as were some of the other countries of 
Europe. Perhaps for this reason, because her people were 
not turned against each other in religious strife, she was 
better prepared than others to begin the settlement of Amer¬ 
ica. At all events, she had founded settlements and taken 
possession of a wide empire in America before the other 
nations of Europe began to send out their people to found 
American colonies. 

40. The Spanish Bring European Comforts.—The first 

Spanish settlements were made in the West Indies. Colum¬ 
bus himself, when returning from his first voyage, left seeds 
for sowing, tools and arms, skilled workmen, a physician, 
and a tailor. On coming again to the new world he brought 
soldiers, missionaries, laborers, knights, and courtiers. His 
ships were laden with horses, sheep, cows, goats, pigs, 
and chickens. The natives were living in America without 
these things, but Europeans wanted the foods and comforts 
to which they were accustomed. Rich as the new world 
was, it was very poor in food plants and domestic animals. 
The Spaniards thought it necessary to bring with them vege¬ 
tables, wheat, and barley—even the vine and fruit trees, 
oranges, lemons, melons, and sugar cane. 2 

ir The year 1519 may be taken as the beginning of the Reformation. 

2 America gave to Europe only one domestic animal, the turkey. 
In the vegetable kingdom the most noted things that came from 
America are quinine, potatoes, and tobacco. 



THE BEGINNINGS OF SPANISH COLONIZATION 27 

41. Growth of Spanish Possessions.—Columbus, on his 
second voyage, landed upon the coast of Haiti, and there he 
found fertile soil, good building stone, and clay for bricks 
and tiles. His men there set at work upon the new town of 
Isabella. Streets and a square were laid out, and good 
public buildings—a storehouse, a church, a hospital, and a 
fort were built, all of stone. Thus Spain began her work of 


K 

I 



A Fleet of Spanish Treasure Ships 


building a colonial empire—a work she was to carry on for 
three hundred years. During the first century after Colum¬ 
bus’ discovery, from one thousand to fifteen hundred 
Spaniards emigrated to America each year. Soon Spain 
could boast that the sun never set upon her possessions, for 
she established her power not alone in America but across 
the Pacific in the Philippine Islands. 

42. Spain Gets Precious Metals from America.—By 
using the labor of the Indians in the mines and on the great 
plantations, Spain was able to draw from her American 
colonies great riches. While bringing silver and gold and 
the products of plantations from America to Spain, the Span¬ 
ish ships were often set upon and robbed by the seamen of 
other nations—especially the English. The growth of this 
piracy led to the custom of sending great fleets under a 
naval escort. Every year two great fleets set sail from 
Spain—one to the islands and one to the mainland. Upon 







28 


PERIOD OF DISCOVERY 


the arrival of the latter fleet at the Isthmus of Panama, long 
droves of mules might be seen wending their way across the 
Isthmus loaded with boxes of gold and silver to be taken to 
Spain. In the public market place of the port an English 
friar saw “ heapes of silver wedges ” which “ lay like heapes 
of stones in the street without any fear or suspicion of being 
lost.” 

43. Spain Claims the Whole of North America.—From 

the treasures and fertile lands of the West Indies, Mexico, 
and Peru, the Spanish king was getting very rich. He 
might have been content, and have left the rest of America 
to other nations. But in 1493, soon after Columbus , dis¬ 
covery, Pope Alexander VI, called upon by the disputant 
nations to decide their rights, tried to mark off the newly dis¬ 
covered lands, assigning one part to Portugal, the other to 
Spain. The next year a division was made by treaty, 
assigning to Portugal part of what is now Brazil, and to 
Spain what proved to be the rest of America. 1 The 
Spaniards, although they did not colonize North America, 
tried to keep other nations out, and the French colonists 
were the first to suffer from this policy. 

44. French Protestants Try to Settle America. —The French 
kings had been so busy with wars in Italy for many years 
after the discovery of America that they had little time or 
money to give to colonizing. Then there arose in France a 
party called the Huguenots, who were opposed to Catholicism, 
and who kept the Catholic kings occupied trying to over¬ 
throw them. By 1562 this quarrel broke into civil war, last¬ 
ing over thirty years. When this war began, Coligny, the 
leader of the Huguenots, sent Ribaut, a gallant seaman, to 
seek a site for a colony in America where Huguenots might 
live free from persecution (1562). 

45. The Settlement Is Destroyed.—At Port Royal, on the 
coast of what is now South Carolina, Ribaut left some of his 

1 To this day Brazil uses the Portuguese language and the rest of 
South America uses Spanish. (See map on p. 17). 




THE BEGINNINGS OF SPANISH COLONIZATION 29 



men while he returned for more colonists. Those who re¬ 
mained endured their life for a year, and then in an ill-made 
boat with sails of shirts and sheets they drifted toward 
France. When nearly dead they were rescued by an English 
ship. A new French expe¬ 
dition found Ribaut’s men 
gone, but they planted a 
new colony on the “River 
of May,” now St. John’s 
River. The Spaniards un¬ 
der Menendez sailed to 
destroy it—partly to keep 
the land for Spain and 
partly to drive out the 
enemies of the Catholics. 

On this expedition Menen¬ 
dez founded St. Augustine 
(1565), the oldest town in 


the United States. He 0ldest House in gT Adgustine 
surprised the Huguenot 

colonists and put most of them to the knife. Thus ended 
the early French attempts to found a colony on the At¬ 
lantic coast. When the sixteenth century closed, no per¬ 
manent settlement save the feeble Spanish outpost at St. 
Augustine had been made on the Atlantic coast of what 
is now the United States. 


Suggested Readings 

Histories: Parkman, Pioneers of France in the New T Vorld, Chaps. 
VII and VIII. Prescott, Conquest of Mexico and Conquest of Peru. 
Bourne, Spain in America, Chaps. XVII-XX. 





30 


PERIOD OF DISCOVERY 


CHAPTER V 

THE BEGINNINGS OF FRENCH SETTLEMENT 

46. Spain Loses Her Early Advantage.—Early in the 
seventeenth century other nations besides Spain were 
ready to take part in the settlement of North America. 
Spain had, as we shall presently learn, lost command of the 

sea and could no longer 
keep other nations from 
the northern parts of the 
new world where she had 
no colonies. She had so 
long neglected her home 
industries, while depend¬ 
ing on the riches of Peru 
and Mexico, that she was 
almost ruined by her un¬ 
successful wars, not only 
with England 1 but with 
the Spanish provinces, the 
Netherlands. England 
and France, on the other 
hand, had grown stronger. 

47. Founding of Port 
Royal.—France was the 
first to take advantage of 
the weakness of Spain. Henry IV, who was a really great 
and far-seeing ruler, wished to build up a French colonial 
empire. He granted land in America to Sieur de Monts. 
The colonists sent out by De Monts sailed into the Bay of 
Fundy, and (July, 1604) settled on an island in the St. 
Croix River. Later they crossed over the Bay of Fundy 
to a more sheltered spot. The new settlement was named 
Port Royal, and the land round about, Acadia. 



Early French Discoveries and 
Settlements 


1 See Chapter VI, pp. 37-40. 













THE BEGINNINGS OF FRENCH SETTLEMENT 31 


48. Champlain, the Founder of Canada.—One of the 

colonists, the energetic Champlain, restlessly voyaged up 
and down the coast, drawing maps and keeping an account 
of all he saw. Later he wrote of these things in a graceful 
way that would have made him famous, even if he had done 
no more. But he became the real founder of New France 



The First Settlement at Quebec 
From a drawing by Champlain. 


A. Storehouse. B. Dovecote. C. Armory and quarters for the work¬ 
men. D. Quarters for the workmen. E. Dial. F. Forge and quar¬ 
ters for the workmen. G. Gallery. H. Apartment of Champlain. 
I. Entrance to the buildings, guarded by a drawbridge. L. W alk, 
ten feet in width. M. Moat. N. Platform for cannon. O. Cham¬ 
plain’s garden. P. Kitchen. Q. Space between the moat and the 
river. R. St. Lawrence River. 


when he sailed up the St. Lawrence, and, where lofty cliffs 
frown upon the river, founded the town of Quebec (1608). 
At the latter place he lived for years as chief trader with the 
Indians. 


































































32 PERIOD OF DISCOVERY 

49. Iroquois Indians Become Foes of the French. —Un¬ 
fortunately for France, Champlain went with an Indian war 
party, in 1609, to a beautiful lake, which he named for himself, 
and there with his firearms he drove away a band of Iroquois 
Indians. The savages with their bows and arrows could do 
nothing, of course, against the terrible weapons of the 
whites. This attack, with another which he later made 
upon the Iroquois, caused them ever after to be the enemies 
of the French. Great results followed from this fact, for 
to go from the St. Lawrence Valley, where the French 
settled, to the Hudson River and the Atlantic coast, one 
must pass through the land of the Iroquois. At a later 

time, when the French wished to drive 
the English away from the settlements 
the English had made on the Atlantic 
coast, the Iroquois, fierce and crafty, and 
ever mindful of their hostility to French¬ 
men, were a barrier and served as a 
protection to the English coast settle¬ 
ments. 

50. French Missionaries and Traders. 

—France, though unable with safety to 
explore southward, could and did push 
back along the St. Lawrence and Ot¬ 
tawa rivers and the Great Lakes. French 
missionaries came to the American wil¬ 
derness and suffered starvation, torture, 
and death in the effort to convert the 
Indians to Christianity. 1 American history has no braver 
heroes, more zealous or more unselfish, than the black- 



A French 
Missionary Priest 
{Father Marquette) 


1 Many of these brave missionaries were Jesuits, or members of the 
Society of Jesus, a religious society founded by Ignatius Loyola. Their 
work in America is told by Francis Parkman in his “ Jesuits in America.” 
The story of Isaac Jogues and his suffering is one of the thrilling stories 
of history. For part of it see Hart, “ American History Told by Con¬ 
temporaries,” I, 129. 





THE BEGINNINGS OF FRENCH SETTLEMENT 33 

robed priests who escaped one torment only to hasten to 
another in the hope of saving a heathen soul. The mission 
stations which these men built along the shores of the Great 
Lakes, and the fur-traders’ posts, founded here and there, 
carried French influence ever deeper into the continent. 

Champlain’s blunder was not repeated, and the French, 
with a tact unknown to the English, always tried to make 
friends with the Indians, whom they 
flattered and treated with great 
ceremony. Indian women became 
the wives of Frenchmen, who then 
took up the Indian way of living, 
wearing Indian dress and dwelling 
in wigwams. Their children often 
became, as did many of the more 
venturesome Frenchmen, the famous 
coureurs de hois, or rangers of the 
woods, who guided the fur-traders’ 
canoes along the rivers and across 
the portages to the very heart 
of the wilderness. Following them 
came the priests and the soldiers, 

building -mission houses and forts which strengthened the 
French hold upon America. During all of the seventeenth 
century this work continued. 

51. La Salle, the Man of Iron.—The greatest of all these 
great Frenchmen was La Salle, one of the boldest explorers 
America has known. If ever man had a will of iron, this 
tireless Frenchman had. Danger and hardships only made 
him the firmer. The story of his adventures will always re¬ 
main the wonder of man. 1 To aid in his work of discovery 



A CoUREUR DE Bois 


1 La Salle’s bodily endurance was as marvelous as his courage. At 
one time in the dreariest winter season, leaving a company on the 
Illinois River, he started with a few companions across the country 
for Montreal. He made rafts to cross the swollen streams, and occasion¬ 
ally a canoe was needed. He plodded along over the prairie and 




34 


PERIOD OF DISCOVERY 


he built a ship, but it was lost in a storm. Another ship 
bringing money for his venture was wrecked. The garrison 
of one of his forts deserted, and Indian allies for whose 
friendship he had toiled hard and long were attacked and 
destroyed by their enemies. Yet he never lost heart, and, 
at last, after four years of grim perseverance, he embarked 
upon the Mississippi, and floated down the river to the Gulf 



French Settlements and Water Routes in the Interior 


of Mexico (April, 1682). “ The brackish water changed to 

brine and the breeze grew fresh with the salt of the sea.” 
Near the mouth of the river was “ performed the ceremony 
of planting the cross and raising the arms of France.” In the 
name of His Majesty Louis XIV, La Salle u took possession 

through forests till he reached Niagara. Leaving there his last wearied 
companion, he pushed on to Montreal. “During sixty-five days he 
had toiled almost incessantly, traveling, by the course he took, about a 
thousand miles through a country beset with every form of peril and 
obstruction ”—the most arduous journey ever made by a Frenchman in 
America. 









THE BEGINNINGS OF FRENCH SETTLEMENT 35 

of that river and of all rivers that enter into it, and of all 
the country watered by them.” 

Thus France, by right of discovery, became possessed of 
the great system of waterways which, with the numerous 
easy portages—where canoes could be 
carried from one river to another—made 
it possible'for Frenchmen to penetrate 
all the vast wilderness lying between the 
Alleghanies and Rockies. A leaden plate 
inscribed with the arms of France and 
the discoverer’s name was buried in the 
earth at the mouth of the Mississippi. 

52. New France—Louisiana and Can¬ 
ada.—Leaden plates, however, would not 
suffice to preserve French rights. Set¬ 
tlements must be made. The first, in 
Louisiana, as the country at the mouth 
of the Mississippi was called, 1 was made 
in 1699. Mobile and New Orleans were 
founded soon after (1701, 1718). Mean¬ 
while small groups of Frenchmen settled 
on the upper branches of the main stream 
in Indiana and Illinois, and to this day 
the Western river valleys and the lake 
region are full of French names, 2 though 
many have been changed by the later English settlers. At 
the very beginning of the eighteenth century Cadillac founded 
Detroit (1701); forts at other points of military advantage 
seemed to assure France’s hold on the Mississippi Valley. 
Thus New France was founded with its two heads, as Park- 
man wrote, one in the canebrakes of Louisiana and the 
other in the snows of Canada. 

1 In honor of Louis XIV, King of France. The settlement was at 
Biloxi Bay. 

2 Joliet, Vincennes, Marquette, Detroit, Sault Ste. Marie. St. Louis, 
Duluth, New Orleans. 



Part of a Leaden 


Plate 

The French buried 
these plates at the 
river mouths that 
they discovered, to 
mark their claim to 
all the land drained 
by the rivers. 






36 


PERIOD OF DISCOVERY 


Suggested Readings 

Histories: Parkman, Pioneers of France in the New World, (Cham¬ 
plain) 236-242, 446, (Quebec) 324-338, (Iroquois) 339-352. Drake, 
Making of the Great West, 75-85. Fiske, New France and New Eng¬ 
land, (Champlain) 58-71, 89-93, (La Salle) 109-132, (Missions) 
98-109. (La Salle) Wright, Stories of American History, 316-330. 
(Champlain) McMurry, Pioneers on Land and Sea. McMurry, Pio¬ 
neers of the Mississippi Valley. Thwaites, Father Marquette. 

Sources: Hart, Source Book, (Champlain) 14-17, (La Salle) 96- 
98. Hart, American History Told by Contemporaries, II, 140-144. 


CHAPTER VI 

THE GREAT ENGLISH SEAMEN OF THE SEVENTEENTH 

CENTURY 

53. The Rise of England.—Though Spain was strong 
enough to keep the French Huguenots from settling on the 
Atlantic coast, she could not long maintain her hold upon 
the northern continent, for England was year by year be¬ 
coming a great and powerful nation. When America was 
discovered, England was in many ways behind the other 
European countries in wealth and power, but during the 
sixteenth century the English people grew strong and self- 
reliant. From the beginning of history, while the Mediter¬ 
ranean Sea was the center of European trade, the British 
Isles had been a somewhat out-of-the-way place, but now 
that the nations of Europe began to look westward for trade 
rather than eastward, the English people held a place of 
real advantage. 

54. English Interest in America.—England, just before 

the discovery of America, had been exhausted by a civil war 
known as the “ War of the Roses,” which had left her little 
strength for colonization. In the reign of Elizabeth (1558- 
1603), however, Englishmen began to look toward America. 
Though little attention was paid at the time to Cabot’s dis- 


GREAT ENGLISH SEAMEN 


37 


coveries, which so closely followed those of Columbus, yet 
they were now thought to give England rights in the un¬ 
known lands over the sea. 

55. The “Sea Dogs.”—A race of daring seamen then 
began to range the seas. The stories of their deeds read 
like pirate tales. They seem to us very strange men, re¬ 
ligious as monks, yet bold, murderous, and crafty as robbers. 
John Hawkins, one of the most famous, ordered his men to 
“ serve God daily ” and “ to keep good company,” but he 
did not hesitate to enslave African negroes. With his 
slaves he would sail to the West Indies. The Spaniards 
there were forbidden by their king 
to buy from Englishmen, but 
Hawkins would bring his ships’ 
guns to bear upon the Spanish 
towns and compel them to buy. 

Then with “ gold, silver, pearls, 
and other jewels great store,” he 
would return to England, to be 
the envy of less fortunate adven¬ 
turers. 

56. Francis Drake.—Even more 
famous than Hawkins was Francis 
Drake, who became such a terror 
to the Spaniards that for a hun¬ 
dred years he was known among 
them as “ The Dragon.” On one 
voyage, when Drake was with Hawkins, the Spaniards at¬ 
tacked their ships—treacherously, as Hawkins claimed—and 
the treachery was never forgotten. On several plundering 
voyages Drake took fearful vengeance. He was a most in¬ 
teresting hero; he dined and supped to the music of violins; 
his table service was silver, richly gilt; he loved every luxury, 
especially perfumes given him by the queen. His men revered 
and yet stood in great awe of him, for they feared while they 
loved him; of all his followers no one would dare to be seated 



Sir Francis Drake 




38 


PERIOD 01’ DISCOVERY 


or to put on his hat in the presence of the commander unless 
leave to do so were repeatedly given. 

57. Drake’s Voyage Around the World.—In 1577 Drake 

started upon a raid which became his famous voyage around 
the world. His daring plan was to sail through the Straits 
of Mageilan and attack the Spanish settlements and treasure 
ships on the west coast of South America. This he did, and 
from one ship he took 1,500 bars of silver, from another 26 
tons of silver and 80 pounds of gold. His men took every¬ 
thing upon which they could lay their hands, ashore or by 
sea, even to the silver chalice in a village church. Drake 
then sailed north, hoping to find a northerly passage around 
America. After giving that up, he repaired his ship, prob¬ 
ably near what is now San Francisco harbor, and sailed 
west across the Pacific. In 1580 he reached England after 
passing through the Spice Islands and around the Cape of 
Good Hope to the Atlantic Ocean. Queen Elizabeth 
knighted Drake upon the deck of his ship, the Golden 
Hind. 

58. Who Shall Rule the Sea.—The queen thus rewarded 
Drake because he was the first Englishman to sail around 
the world; but she also seemed to approve of his robbing the 
Spanish treasure ships. Spain and England were supposed 
to be at peace, yet these hardy English sailors were ruin¬ 
ing Spanish commerce. Spain depended largely upon the 
gold and silver from the mines of Peru to build her 
navy that ruled the seas, and without a strong navy 
her colonies and other riches might slip from her grasp. 
If her navy were beaten she could not prevent England 
from placing colonies on the Atlantic coast. The time 
had come, then, for a mighty struggle between England and 
Spain. 

59. English Try to Make Settlements.—As this great 
struggle was coming on, some adventurous Englishmen made 
voyages to America to find places suitable for settlement. 
On one of these voyages Sir Humphrey Gilbert lost his 


GREAT ENGLISH SEAMEN 


39 

life. 1 His kinsman, Sir Walter Raleigh, 2 a royal favorite, took 
up the task. Raleigh never saw America’s shore, but he 
planned expeditions and furnished money, seeking in vain 
to found colonies. A colony was actually placed (1585) on 
Roanoke Island, in Virginia, but the settlers found no gold, 
and when their food failed they were glad to return to 
England with Drake, who passed that way. The only 
thing that came of this attempt was that potatoes, and the 
dried tobacco leaves, which the Indians had taught the 
English to smoke, were brought to England. A later colony, 
settled in 1587 on Roanoke Island, fared worse, for the 
settlers, men, women, and children, were never after to be 
found. 

60. The Defeat of the Invincible Armada.—The attacks 
of Hawkins and Drake and the attempts to settle America 
were maddening to the King of Spain, and one need not won¬ 
der. Into dungeons he flung English sailors “ laden with 
irons, without sight of sun or moon.” At last the Spanish 
king could bear no more, and he planned to send a fleet 
against England, whence came the “ sea dogs,” as the 
English sailors were called. Drake delayed the time of 
sailing by dashing into the Spanish harbor and burning the 
provision ships. In 1588 the “ Invincible Armada,” as the 
great Spanish fleet was called, appeared in the British Chan¬ 
nel. The Spanish ships were greater in number than the 
English ships, but the English guns were heavier, and the 
“ sea dogs,” with better made ships, surpassed the Spaniards 
in seamanship. Hawkins and Drake, and others who had 

1 Before his bark was swallowed up, he was heard to say: “We are 
as near Heaven by sea as by land”—words that must have been in¬ 
spiring to the old English sea rovers. 

2 Raleigh was one of the most interesting and charming men of his 
day. He is said first to have won the favor of Elizabeth by his prompt 
gallantry in throwing his handsome cloak over a mud puddle that the 
queen might pass over dry-shod. He had a bright wit and an able 
mind. He loved England and he planned great things for her in the 
new world, but he was unfortunate in his plans for colonization. 




40 


PERIOD OF DISCOVERY 


fought the Spanish too long to fear them, kept cool heads, 
and fired true. 

61. England Can Found Colonies Without Fear of Spain. 

—What Drake 1 and his men failed to do, storms com¬ 
pleted, and only about fifty of the one hundred and thirty or 
more ships returned to Spain. Within a few years the sea 



The Spanish Armada and the English Fleet in the Channel 
From an old tapestry in the House of Lords. 


power of England was established. Englishmen might now 
found American colonies in safety! To-day North America 
is largely controlled by the English and other related races, 
South America, by the Spanish and Portuguese. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: Fiske, Old Virginia and her Neighbors, I, 15-28; (Gil¬ 
bert and Raleigh) I, 28-40. (Drake) Hale, Stories of Discovery, 
86-106. McMurry, Pioneers on Land and Sea. Bolton, Famous 
Voyagers. 

Sources: Hart, American History Told by Contemporaries, I, 158. 

Fiction: Longfellow, Sir Humphrey Gilbert. 

1 When Drake died he was buried at sea, and an English poet wrote: 

“The waves became his winding sheet, 

The waters were his tomb; 

But for his fame, the ocean sea was not sufficient room.” 

If we call a man great by what he accomplished, we must call Drake 
great. It has well been said that the English navy and the English 
empire go back to Sir Francis Drake. 
















II 

PERIOD OF ENGLISH COLONIZATION AND 
STRUGGLE FOR SUPREMACY IN 
NORTH AMERICA 


CHAPTER VII 

THE ENGLISH COLONIZE VIRGINIA 

« 

62. Trading Companies of the Sixteenth Century.—Dun 

ing the century in which Frenchmen were pushing westward, 
Englishmen were settling along the Atlantic coast. Raleigh’s 
attempt at settlement failed because the task seemed too 
great for a single man. It was a big undertaking and needed 
the wealth and the energy of many men. In our day one 
man does not try to build a railroad or to work a great mine, 
but many men unite in a corporation into which all put their 
money and their brains. So, during the sixteenth century, 
Englishmen and Dutchmen and Frenchmen who wanted to 
trade in far off lands, like Russia or Africa or the East Indies, 
formed companies in which each man bought a certain share. 
The company secured a charter 1 from the king in return 
for a certain part of the profits which he was to receive. It 
was natural, therefore, in 1606, that “ sundry knights, gen¬ 
tlemen, merchants, and other adventurers ” of Bristol, 
Exeter, Plymouth, and London, wishing to colonize America, 
should form a company, and seek a charter from King James, 
then reigning in England. 

63. Reasons for English Settlements in America.—There 
were at this time many reasons why Englishmen should try 
to plant colonies in America. First, the gradual changing 
in England of plowlands 2 into sheep farms had taken away 

1 A permission to do business under the king’s protection. 

a Lands under cultivation and on which grains or other farm prod¬ 
ucts were grown. 


42 





42 THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 

work to which many men were used. One shepherd could 
watch sheep ranging over a large piece of land which for¬ 
merly it had taken many men to plow and sow and reap. 
It took a long while to learn a trade, and there were no great 
factories in which men might find employment running 
the machines. Many men, therefore, were out of the only 
work that they could do—tilling the soil. The wars also 
were over for a time, and soldiers, who often followed war 
as a trade, were out of employment and wanted adventure. 
As a result of all this idleness, there were many crimes. If the 

idle men could be coaxed 
off to America, it would 
prevent England’s being 
overcrowded, and the 
colonists could earn 
money for themselves 
and for those who pro¬ 
vided money to take 
them over. Finally, the 
colonists expected to 
find gold and precious 
stones, just as the Span¬ 
iards had done. From 
voyages lately made, 1 

m _ men had returned with 

I ERRiTORY Granted by the Charter . . . _ _ 

OF 1606 promises of gold and 

tales of a warm climate 
suited to raising nutmegs, and these stories set England 
agog with interest in America. 

64. The English King Grants a Charter.—The king was so 
eager to get English colonies in America that he made two 
companies of the men asking for a charter. There was one 
of London merchants known as the London Company, and 
one of the men from the western parts of England known 



1 Gosnold, Pring, and Weymouth ventured in the years 1602-5. 











THE ENGLISH COLONIZE VIRGINIA 


43 


as the Plymouth Company. 1 The king meant to be liberal 
as to the government he provided for them, but at best tha 
charter left the company at the mercy of the king and the 
colonists at the mercy of the company. 

Both companies made haste to fit out ships and gather 
stores and settlers. The western men, or the Plymouth Com¬ 
pany, founded a settlement (1607) at the mouth of the 
Kennebec River, in Maine, but abandoned it after a hard 
winter. The London Company was, as we shall see, more 
fortunate. 

65. The Founding of Jamestown, 1607.—In the spring of 
1607 the London Company’s ships sailed with settlers for the 
new world, and in May of 1607 they entered the wide mouth of 
the river, which was called the James in honor of the English 
king. Ashore, they found, as they wrote, “ all the ground 
bespread with many sweet and delicate flowers of divers col¬ 
ors and kinds.” Heaven and earth, they thought, “ had 
never agreed better to frame a place for man’s habita¬ 
tion.” 

66. The Settlers Suffer and are Discouraged.—They found 
it not wholly a paradise, however, for there came “ savages 
creeping from the Hills like Beares, with their Bowes in their 
Mouthes,” but after they felt the “ sharpness ” of the white 
man’s shot, they fled “ with great noise.” But the colonists’ 
own weakness was their worst enemy. “ Because they found 
not English cities,” wrote one of their leaders, “ nor such 
fair houses, nor their accustomed dainties, with feather beds 
and down pillows, taverns and ale houses in every breath¬ 
ing place, neither such plenty of gold and silver as . . . they 
expected, they had little or no care but to pamper their bel- 

1 These grants of land provided by the charter, extended 100 miles in 
from the coast and were to be bounded by the parallels of latitude shown 
in the map. The king provided that in the land between the parallels 
of 38° and 41° neither company should make a settlement nearer than 
one hundred miles to one already established in this same zone by 
the other company. 



44 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 



lies ... or procure their means to return for England; for 
the country was to them a misery, a ruin, a death.” 

67. Men Hunt for Gold and Many Die.—Such men as these 
were ill fitted to fell trees, plant corn, and build homes in the 
forest. Indeed, many of them probably never intended to 
stay in America, but came expecting to pick Up gold 
and silver along the shores. As the site of their town they 
chose a marshy peninsula reeking with malaria. Hovels and 


The Landing at Jamestown 
From a painting by John G. Chapman. 

ragged tents and even caves or dugouts served as dwellings. 
Instead of preparing to live, men hunted for gold. “ Our drink 
was water, our lodgings castles in the air,” wrote one of the 
wisest of them. Living on worm-eaten barley from the ship 
and lying upon the bare ground soon brought on “ burning 
fevers.” Death came to many, and the half-sick living men 
could only drag out the bodies of the dead “like dogs.” 
When half were dead the rest were saved by the Indians 
who sold them game and corn for trinkets and gewgaws. 

68. John Smith.—At first the leaders of the colonists were 
quite unfit to rule, but with the hard times the abler men 








THE ENGLISH COLONIZE VIRGINIA 


45 

gained control. Most prominent was that bold adventurer, 
John Smith, who became president of their council. He had led 
a most marvelous life if half of his stories are true. According 
to these tales, he had been a soldier in nearly every country 
of Europe. He had killed and beheaded three Turks in sin¬ 
gle combat. Later he had been enslaved, made love to a 
beautiful lady, and ended his enslavement by killing his mas¬ 
ter with a flail and escaping to Russia in disguise. Thence 
he wandered all the way to Morocco, and came to England in 
time to go out with the Virginia colonists. 1 It is needless to 
say that most historians shake their heads very gravely 
over these stories. 

69. ‘‘ He Who Will Not Work Shall Not Eat. ’ ’—It was John 

Smith’s self-reliance and boldness, nevertheless, that saved 
the colony. More colonists had come at the end of the first 
winter, and they were worse than the first. They were idle 
fellows, chiefly from the streets and jails of London. To 
these and all the rest Smith declared: “You must obey this 
now for a law: that he who will not work shall not eat.” It 
was the best law possible for such a time and place. It would 
hardly have been necessary except for the foolish plan of the 
London Company not to give land to each man to work for 
himself, but to have all work and share alike. The lazy men, 
of course, were quite willing to let others do the work as long 
as they could eat of the common stores. Even the men of 
energy would not work very hard, for they could thus add 
nothing to their own property. When Smith left the colony, 
in 1609, so little work was done that “ starving times ” came 
upon them. Men lived “ by roots, herbs, acorns, walnuts, 
berries, . . . even the very skins of their horses.” So ter¬ 
rible was the loss of life that of the first thousand settlers 

1 There, according to his own story, he very soon had a wonderful 
adventure. When captured by the Indians and about to be slain, he 
was saved by Pocahontas, daughter of Powhatan, the chief of the 
tribe. The Indian maiden Pocahontas really existed and married one 
John Rolfe, a colonist. 



46 THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 



in Virginia, less than one hundred lived to tell of their 
troubles. 

70. The New Charter.—Meanwhile the London Company 
got a new charter (1609), by the provisions of which a gov¬ 
ernor, who was 
a sort of busi¬ 
ness manager, 
was added to 
the council in 
Virginia. The 
company’s land 
was, by the new 
charter, made to 
extend four hun¬ 
dred miles along 
the coast and 
“up into the 
land through¬ 
out 1 from sea 
to sea, west and 
northwest.” 

71. Reforms. 


Land Granted by Charter to the Virginia 
Company in 1609 


-—There came now one Sir Thomas Dale to rule the colonists, 
and he ruled with a rod of iron. He enforced Smith’s rule 
by whipping those who would not work, and he wisely 
began to break down the old system of holding all prop¬ 
erty in common. He gave three acres of land to each of 
the old colonists, and let them have time to work for 
themselves. This change was helpful, for men were willing 
to work for themselves. A few years later women were 
brought over, and then men came to have real homes here. 
With homes and wives and families, men were willing to stay 
in America. 


1 Many years later this wording of the grant gave Virginia a chance 
to claim all the land northwest of the Ohio River and led to many 
disputes. 













THE ENGLISH COLONIZE VIRGINIA 


47 


72. The First American Legislature.—Through the efforts 
of Sir Edwin Sandys and other liberal members of the com¬ 
pany, the people of Virginia were at last given a share in 
making the laws. By 1619 eleven settlements were estab¬ 
lished in Virginia. Of these, each was to elect two men to 
sit in a “ House of Burgesses ” which was to make laws or to 
assent to those made for them in England. The cruel and 
tyrannical rule of one man like Dale was no longer possible, 
for the government was now more nearly by the people and 
for the people. This first representative legislature was 
elected by the settlers, and it met in the church at James¬ 
town (1619). Here was the real though humble beginning 
of American government, and, though very much simpler, 
it was something like the government we now have. Few 
events in all history are more important than this gathering 
of free representatives in the little church in the Virginia 
wilderness. 

73. England and Representative Government.—It was 

perfectly natural that Englishmen should set up such a gov¬ 
ernment, for from time out of mind there had been represen¬ 
tative government in England. As early as the thirteenth 
century the king had asked that men be sent as representa¬ 
tives to a great national assembly that came to be called a 
Parliament. Finally, the kings could get no money unless 
Parliament would agree to tax the people for it. This often 
vexed the kings sorely, but they could not get.rid of Parlia¬ 
ment. 

74. The London Company Loses Its Charter.—King James 
liked neither the members of the company which owned Vir¬ 
ginia nor their liberal way of governing their colonists. After 
an Indian massacre which took place in Virginia in 1622, the 
government charged the company with neglecting to care for 
the settlers’ safety. The charter was declared void, the com¬ 
pany came to an end, and the province (1624) became the 
king’s own, and was ruled by his chosen governor. In the 
following year (1625) King James died, and as his son Charles 


48 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


paid less attention to the colonists, their prosperity was not 
injured by the change of method in their government. They 
even kept their assembly as before. 

75. Tobacco Begins Virginia’s Prosperity.—The colony 
had by this time become so strongly rooted that it could en¬ 
dure misfortunes which earlier might have ruined it. The 
tobacco, which the colonists found growing wild, they had at 
last learned to dry and prepare for smoking, and a better va- 



A Modern Tobacco Field 


riety was early transplanted from the West Indies. Euro¬ 
pean people began to use it in large quantities, although in 
far-away Russia the Czar decreed that smokers should lose 
their noses, and King James 1 proclaimed that the use of 
tobacco tended “ to a general and new corruption both of 
Men’s Bodies and Manners.” But, in spite of kings, men 
wanted it, and Virginians could raise it. Every effort had 
been made in the first years of the colony to turn the colo¬ 
nists’ attention to silk culture, and the production of wine 
or of cotton, but as soon as the colonists were sure that gold 

1 He wrote what he called “A Counter-Blast to Tobacco,” and spoke of 
it as “this filthy novelty” whose smoke nearest resembles “the horrible 
stygian smoke of the pit that is bottomless.” 







THE ENGLISH COLONIZE VIRGINIA 


49 


and pearls and spices were not to be found in Virginia, they 
settled down to the sober, money-making business of tobacco 
raising. Even the margins of Jamestown’s broad streets 
were planted with it. 

76. Indentured Servants and Negro Slaves.—Virginia 
lacked but one thing to complete its prosperity and that was 
labor. Every means was tried to get workmen. England 
had plenty of paupers, vagabonds, and criminals, 1 and these 
the king sent over to get rid of them cheaply. Imprisonment 
for debt was common, and, to escape prison, men could sell 
themselves or their labor for a number of years. Debtors 
were sometimes glad to work their way to freedom in Virginia. 
Villainous sea captains kidnaped men and boys and sold them 
in America. Some poor people, tempted by advertisements 
full of false pictures of the fortunes to be gained in Amer¬ 
ica, sold their labor to pay their passage, taking the chance of 
finding a kind or an evil master. By laboring for some years, 
these indentured servants earned their freedom. 

These servants did not become such a source of evil as 
did the negro slaves brought to Virginia in 1619 by a Dutch 
trading vessel. After some twenty-five years negro labor 
was used more and more, and negro slavery became fixed 
in this and other southern colonies. 

77. Virginia Becomes a Permanent Colony.—Thus, as we 
have seen, the English race had been safely planted and had 
taken root on American soil. The early days of folly and its 
terrible results were past. Rule by a tyrant governor had 
yielded to rule by the people who were to be governed. Fe¬ 
verish search for gold and trust in luck was replaced by dili¬ 
gent labor for the slow but sure profits of a good farm. 
Laborers had been secured, and the owners of land might now 
take time for some of the less practical concerns of life—social 

1 Unlicensed peddlers, jugglers, and tinkers, and University students 
begging without a certificate were regarded as vagabonds, and many 
were imprisoned for what seem to us very small offenses; these men were 
not always really bad or vicious. 



50 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


intercourse, political discussion, and the reading of books. 
Men of Virginia were still Englishmen in their manners and 
customs, but the forest and the new life that encompassed 
them were working silent changes. At least they no longer 
thought of returning to England. Soon there were children 
who knew only the vast forests, the newly cleared fields, and 
the quiet rivers that flowed to the sea which separated them 
from the land of their forefathers. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: Johnson, Boys’ Life of Captain John Smith. Cooke, 
Stories of the Old Dominion. Chandler, Makers of Virginia History. 
Fiske, Old Virginia and Her Neighbors, I. Coffin, Old Times in the 
Colonies. Bass, Stories of Pioneer Life. 

Sources: Hart, Source Book, 11-14. Hart, American History Told 
by Contemporaries, I, 218-225, 229-233, 237-241. 

CHAPTER VIII 
THE PILGRIMS 

78. The Puritans.—The Virginia colony was founded be¬ 
cause there were English business men who wished to extend 
British trade and commerce to the new world. The next 
English colony was to have a very different beginning. Re¬ 
ligion and not business was its seed. To understand this it 
should be recalled that the Reformation 1 had a peculiar 
result in England. The English part of the great world¬ 
embracing Catholic Church merely took as its head the King 
of England instead of the Pope. Further than this neither 
the English kings nor most of their subjects wished to go. 
The method of worshiping, the ceremonies in church, the 
wearing of the cap and the surplice, the use of the sign of 
the cross, and of the ring in marriage, were kept as in former 
days. But there were people who wished that “ all, even the 
slightest vestiges,” of the old forms of worship should be re- 


1 See Chapter IV, pp. 25, 26. 



THE PILGRIMS 


51 


moved from the Church. Certain old prayers, hymns, and 
saints’ days annoyed them and they wanted these relics of 
the old worship given up. Many there were, too, that came 
to disagree on more serious matters with the leaders of the 
great national Church. All who wished these changes from 
the service of the established church were called Puritans. 

79. The Nonconformists and Separatists.—Among the 
Puritans there were several groups. One group did not like 
the bishops or the prayer book of the Church of England or 
the w~ay of appointing or paying ministers; but they wished 
to stay in the Church and reform it. They were called the 
Nonconformists, because they would not conform to the 
rules of the Church they attended. The second group dis¬ 
liked the same things as the Nonconformists, but they 
went further. They did not want all the congregations of 
England united into a national church, but they thought that 
each congregation should be complete in itself, independent of 
all other congregations—merely 11 under the government of 
God and Christ.” They would not stay within the English 
Church hoping for reform, but would break away. They 
were therefore called Separatists. Both groups were per¬ 
secuted by Queen Elizabeth and King James, but the second 
group suffered most of all. 

80. Th8 Flight to Holland.—A congregation of these 
Separatists used to meet in the house of Elder Brewster, 
postmaster and innkeeper in “ the meane townlet of Scrooby ” 
on the great northern road from London to Edinburgh. 
Richard Clifton and John Robinson, who had been driven 
from their former pastorates, preached to them in spite of the 
threat of King James that he would harry all Puritans “ out 
of the land, or else do worse.” The Scrooby congregation 
was made up of just common country people, plowmen and 
reapers, but they were fired by a great idea, to which they 
were steadfast. With a devoted leader they were destined 
to do America a great service. In John Robinson they found 
their inspiration. Even his enemy owned that he was “ the 


52 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


most learned, polished, and modest spirit that ever separated 
from the Church of England." When the Scrooby folk were 
“ hunted and persecuted on every side," as one of their num¬ 
ber wrote, “ so as their former afflictions were but as flea-bit- 
ings in comparison of these which now came upon them," 
they “ were faine to ffle and leave their houses," 1 and to fol¬ 
low their noble leader to Amsterdam in Holland. 

81. Discontent in Holland.—Holland was then a place of 
refuge for all oppressed—“ a cage of unclean birds," “ the 
great mingle mangle of religion," as its enemies called it. 2 
Therefore, there were many other refugees in Amsterdam, and 
Robinson and Brewster found so much religious dispute 3 
that they moved with their people to Leyden. After settling 
there, “ it was not long," Bradford tells us, “ before they saw 
the grimme and grisly face of povertie coming upon them like 
an armed man." From farming, to which they were used, 
they had to turn to mechanical labor. Not only they but 
their children must work, barely to live, and thus were the 
children being robbed of the strength which would make them 
vigorous men and women. Finally, the worried parents 
turned their thoughts on “ some of those vast and un¬ 
peopled countries of America." At least they could not be 
worse off there, they thought, and their children would grow 
up to be English ana not Dutch. 

82. The Pilgrims Sail to America.—From the Virginia 
Company these Pilgrims—for so we call these wander- 

1 These quotations are from William Bradford, who was long the 
Governor of Plymouth and wrote an interesting history of the settle¬ 
ment. 

2 These hard names were given because Holland allowed just what 
we now allow everywhere all over our country. Now we may say or 
print what opinions we have on religion. We may go to church or stay 
at home, and help support the minister or not, but in the days of Brew¬ 
ster the government made rules about such things and people had to 
obey. 

3 Over silly questions as to whether or not the parson’s wife should 
wear whalebone in her bodice, etc. 



THE PILGRIMS 


53 


ers from Scrooby — obtained a right to settle in Vir¬ 
ginia. On very hard conditions they secured money of 
some London merchants. From the king, whose interfer¬ 
ence they feared, they could obtain only the intimation 
that he would “ wink at their practices.” Still, they argued, 
there was little use of a more definite promise, for if later 
he should “ desire to wrong them, though they had a seal as 
broad as the house floor ” it would not save them from the 
king’s tyranny, and so they decided to run the risk and to go. 

The members of the congregation at Leyden who de¬ 
cided to go had a short passage to Southampton in England, 
and were there joined by others. In September, 1620, after 
many delays, one hundred and two brave souls set sail from 
Plymouth on board the Mayflower . The sea was rough and 
stormy, and they were driven by autumn gales until the cap¬ 
tain lost his reckoning. They intended to go to Virginia, but 
when they first sighted land, it was the low, sandy shore of 
Cape Cod. They tried to sail southward to the land that 
had been granted them by the London Company, but dan¬ 
gerous shoals frightened them back, and they anchored 
thankfully in the harbor formed by the hook at the end of 
Cape Cod (November, 1620). 

83. The Famous Mayflower Compact.—They were north 
of the land granted to the London Company, and they had 
no legal right to settle there. But they felt that they could 
not go south through the dangerous winter storms, and they 
resolved to stay and later to get permission to remain. Some 
of the strangers among them—for a few were not of the 
Leyden company—now refused to obey the Pilgrim leaders, 
who got their only right to rule from the London Company. 
The Pilgrims, therefore, drew up a compact, which nearly all 
signed, agreeing to obey such just and equal laws as the sign¬ 
ers—the “civil body politic,” as the quaint phrase ran—might 
make. Thus the Pilgrim leaders secured the help of the law- 
abiding men in making the unruly ones obey commands. 
This “ Mayflower Compact ” was not a frame of govern- 


54 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


ment like our national or state constitution, but was a 
simple agreement among the members of a company. And 
yet on this simple agreement and promise they formed their 




* 





Facsimile of Some of the Signatures on the Mayflower 

Compact 


colony and raised their little state on the edge of the 
American continent. 

84. The Founding of Plymouth.—Having settled the 
question of government, they explored the shores of Cape 
Cod Bay for a month. After a party led by Captain Miles 
Standish 1 had discovered Plymouth harbor, they decided tc 
found their colony on that shore. There was much suffer¬ 
ing before spring. The cold and lack of good food and of 
warm houses brought death to over half the Pilgrim band; 
at times there were but six or seven sound persons who 
could attend the sick or dying. In spite of their terrible 
suffering the Pilgrims did not wish to go back to England, 


1 Who figures as a soldier hero in Longfellow’s poem “ The Court¬ 
ship of Miles Standish.” 





THE PILGRIMS 


55 


and when the Mayflower sailed in April not one of the 
colonists returned with her. 1 They began rather to plant 
corn, to make “ lawe and order ” for themselves, to set nets 
for fish, in short, to stay and make their living on the lonely 
shore of the continent. The Puritan Colony and the Puri¬ 
tan Church in America were begun. 

85. Great Difficulties Overcome.—The place where the Pil¬ 
grims settled proved to be an ancient piece of ground once 
tilled by Indians. A plague had destroyed the tribe which had 
lived there. One of the Indians who lived in the neighborhood 
came in the spring offering to teach them how to plant their 
corn. 2 His friendship and a treaty they soon made with 
Massasoit, a neighboring chief, enabled them to live at 
peace, and keep the wolf of hunger from the door. 3 Yet 
for a time they barely grew enough food for all, because the 
lazy ones would not work as long as what was grown must go 
into a common stock out of which each was to be fed. This 
fact bred discontent and indifference here as in Virginia, and 
at length a small piece of land was given to each head of a 
family that he might till it for himself. Living then be¬ 
came easier, and gradually the people grew out of poverty 
and into comfort. They fished and traded for furs, paid their 

1 “ O strong hearts and true. Not one went back in the M ay flower, 

No, not one looked back, who had set his hand to the ploughing. 

Long in silence they watched the receding sail of the vessel, 

Much endeared to them all, as something living and human.” 

—Longfellow's “The Courtship of Miles Standish.” 

2 This Indian, Squanto, helped the whites greatly. He directed 
them how to set their corn, says Bradford, where to take fish, and 
to procure other commodities, . . . and never left them till he died. 
He showed them that they must get fish to put in the hills of corn, 
because the land was lean and worn out. 

3 They had to present a brave front to the Indians also, as they did 
in the famous case when an Indian chief sent a messenger to Plymouth 
with a rattlesnake skin wrapped about a bundle of arrows. It was a 
challenge to fight, and Bradford, the governor, filled the skin with powder 
and bullets and sent it back. The chief did not care so much about 
fighting after that. 



56 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


debt to the London merchants, and finally became owners of 
the land where they had settled. 

86. The Pilgrims Govern Themselves.—They managed 
their own affairs as they chose, for their form of government 
was, as we have said, merely the outgrowth of the Mayflower 
Compact. They chose their own governor, they passed their 
own laws, and, though they did not deny that they were sub¬ 
jects of the English king, he did not trouble himself about 



A Pilgrim Meeting House and Fort 

them—humble fishermen, farmers and fur traders on the 
coast of America, who were making no disturbance and 
finding their own living. Thus they reared their little colony 
and found their way to prosperity and peace. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: Nina Moore-Tiffany, Pilgrims and Puritans. Drake, 
Making of New England, 149-155. Eggleston, Beginners of the 
Nation. Fiske, Beginnings of New England. Glascock, Stories of 
Columbia, 69-81. Higginson, American Explorers, 311-337. 

Sources: Hart, American History Told by Contemporaries, I, 167- 
170, 187-190, 345-359. 

Fiction: Longfellow, The Courtship of Miles Standish. Hawthorne, 
Grandfather’s Chair, 10-26. 














THE FOUNDING OF MASSACHUSETTS BAY 


57 


CHAPTER IX 

THE FOUNDING OF MASSACHUSETTS BAY 

87. Plymouth a Light to the Nation. —We have thus seen 
how the little band of Pilgrims founded a self-supporting set¬ 
tlement on the New England shore, and how, despite hard¬ 
ships, they won a living from the land and grew in strength. 
We must now trace the growth of a larger and more pow¬ 
erful settlement that was made a few miles to the north of 
Plymouth, a settlement that prospered marvelously and was 
the center for the building up of much of New England. 

88. Settlements along the Coast and Granting of the 
Massachusetts Charter. —Even while Plymouth was strug¬ 
gling through its early years of trial, settlements were made 
here and there along the coast. A solitary settler would 
build a hut and try to find a living; or fishermen that had 
come across the stormy north Atlantic would found stations 
on the coast, dreary outposts where they could dry their fish 
and refit their vessels. One of these stations was founded 
on Cape Ann, and John White, a Puritan preacher of 
England, appears to have been interested in the place, hop¬ 
ing to surround the fishermen and settlers with whole¬ 
some Christian influences. He enlisted the help of some 
wealthy Englishmen and secured a grant of land from the 
Council for New England, who owned all that northern 
country . 1 Soon afterwards these men and others obtained a 
charter from the king. Under the direction of this company, 
known as the Governor and Company of Massachusetts Bay, 
a great movement began for the settlement of the New World. 

89. Harsh Government in England: Migration to New 
England. —To understand the meaning of this movement, we 

1 The New England Council was a company which had taken the 
place of the Plymouth Company (see pp. 42-43). It granted a strip of 
land through to the “South Sea” between a line drawn three miles south 
of the Charles River and a line three miles north of the Merrimac. 



58 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


must knew something of English conditions that caused it. 
There had been many objections to the rule of James I; but 
when he died, in 1625, and his son Charles came to the throne, 
new troubles set in. The new king had high notions 

of his own powers, and was intent 
on doing much as he chose without 
regard for the wishes of the Eng¬ 
lish people. He began almost at 
once to quarrel with the House of 
Commons, and acted as if the only 
business of the House was to provide 
him with money and to let him do 
as he wished. The House did not 
weakly yield to his commands, for 
among its members were men of 
strong and lofty patriotism, men 
like Sir John Eliot, 1 whose zeal for 
liberty and whose noble courage led 
them to resist unlawful authority to 
the end. In 1629 Charles dissolved 
Parliament and for the next eleven 
years ruled without any. These 
were fateful years for England. Men were cruelly punished 
for one reason Qr another. 2 During these eventful years 
thousands of persons, almost in despair of liberty in Eng¬ 
land, sailed for New England to build up Puritan com¬ 
monwealths on the new continent. 

It means much in American history that these men came to 
America, in part, at least, as a protest against a government in 



The Flag of New 
England 

The flag was bright blue 
with a white square in 
which was a red cross. 
In the upper left-hand 
corner was a globe. 


1 Eliot was one of England’s great men, whose name should be held 
in memory. Thrust into the Tower of London because of his valiant 
opposition to the king, he died there, a martyr to the cause of liberty. 

2 Some of these punishments were very shocking. It is a noteworthy 
fact that now we do not like even to read about such things; thus far 
has the world moved from days of cruelty. See what the Constitu¬ 
tion of the United States says about cruel and unusual punishments. 
Amendment VIII. 












THE FOUNDING OF MASSACHUSETTS BAY 59 

which they could not trust. Their own principles of liberty 
grew stronger in the free air of a new world. 

90. The Charter.—Just as Charles dismissed his Parlia¬ 
ment and prepared to rule alone, the movement for the set¬ 
tlement of New England began in earnest. At the end of 
March, 1629, the charter to the Governor and Company of 
Massachusetts Bay was granted. It provided for a governor 
and eighteen assistants and for meetings of a general court 
composed of the members of the company. 1 

91. The Leaders Decide to Come across the Ocean.— 
There was little in the wording of the charter to show that 
this company was to be different 
from the one that had founded 
Virginia, but in the summer of 
1629 an important difference ap¬ 
peared. The governor of the com¬ 
pany proposed that the method 
of ruling the settlers from Eng¬ 
land 2 should be given up. Why 
not transfer the government of 
the company to the New World? 

This scheme was thought over by 
the leaders, and some of them, 
coming together at Cambridge, 
in England, considered the A Typical Puritan Leader 
“ greatness of the work” and From a statue by Augustus St. 
“ God’s glory and the Church’s Gaudens. 

good.” They then decided to go to the New World them¬ 
selves. 

92. The Puritan Leaders.—These leaders were men of 
education and refinement. They were not poor or misera- 

1 To hold the land which had been granted by the Council for New 
England, some men were sent out under John Endicott, “a fit instru¬ 
ment to begin this wilderness work, of courage bold, undaunted, yet 
sociable and of a cheerful spirit, loving and austere.” 

2 By choosing officers and sending them to Massachusetts, and by 
sending over orders and laws. 










60 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


ble; and to offer for the Church’s sake to move off into the 
American wilderness was a sign of their earnest and serious 
conviction. Chief among them was John Winthrop, a de¬ 
voted Puritan, a scholar, a wise and skillful man of affairs, 
a gentle but determined spirit. 1 

93. The Great Migration.—Winthrop was elected gov¬ 
ernor, and in the spring of 1630 he set sail with a large com¬ 
pany. Other vessels followed and in the course of the next 
few years, while Charles was ruling without a Parliament in 
England, while men were being taxed without their own con¬ 
sent, while Puritans w r ere being harried and persecuted, 
thousands fled to New England. This was a great migra¬ 
tion. Many of the settlers left comfortable homes in Eng¬ 
land for log cabins in the American wilderness; some of them 
were graduates of the great English universities; not a few 
held places of distinction in English society. But fleeing 
from their misgoverned country, tliej^ carried with them to 
the New World principles of liberty and justice. 

94. Boston is Founded.—Within a few months from the 
first migrations, little settlements began to be founded in the 
neighborhood of Boston harbor. The peninsula, u very un¬ 
even, abounding in small hollows and swamps, covered w r ith 
blueberries and other bushes,” was chosen by Winthrop as a 
place of residence, and here he and his followers “ began to 
build their houses against winter; and this place was called 
Boston.” 

95. The People in Groups.—Thus, at the very begin¬ 
ning, the Massachusetts settlers gathered in little groups, 
and the town became one of the most significant things 


1 It must have been very hard for Winthrop to go, for he had a com¬ 
fortable home in England and he loved his native land. We have his 
reasons, for he wrote them out, perhaps to convince himself: he could, 
by going, carry the Gospel to America; England was overcrowded, so 
that man “the most precious of all creatures, is here more vile and bare 
than the earth we tread upon” and children were counted as mere 
burdens; in America, God prepared a great continent for the use of man. 



THE FOUNDING OF MASSACHUSETTS BAY 


61 


in New England life. A settler did not go off into the 
forest, make a clearing, build a house, and live with his family 
far from others of his kind. 1 From the beginning, settle¬ 
ments were made as were these first about Boston harbor. 
The houses were not far apart; they were ranged along the 
village street. A man’s plowland and meadow were likely to 
be some little distance from his house. Each one had the 
right to feed his cows in the common pasture and to get his 
wood from the forest. The settlers went to the church, 
which was the center of Puritan life. Living thus together 
and interested in the management of roads and fields, in 
church and in schools, they found many matters to talk 
over together, and they met in town meeting for the pur¬ 
pose. There they discussed the town’s needs, decided mat¬ 
ters of common interest, chose men to look after the fields and 
fences, levied taxes, elected school teachers, and, in short, did 
the scores of things that their simple, active life together 
demanded. 

96. The Town the Unit.—The town, therefore, was more 
than a number of houses or a group of people. It became 
the unit of political and social life of the New England colo¬ 
nies. 2 We must picture to ourselves the growth of this 
region by the establishment year by year of new bodies of 
settlers, building their houses, their churches, and their 
schools, preparing to live and worship together. 

1 That is the way the great West was built up, but not New England. 

2 It is generally difficult for Western or Southern pupils to get a clear 
idea of the New England town, because “town” means to them a 
group of houses and a number of people. Sometimes large cities in 
the West are referred to in common speech as towns; sometimes the 
town means a little wayside hamlet, where a few houses are clustered 
around a schoolhouse, a country store and perhaps a church. The 
New England town, in its early day and now, in some measure, corre¬ 
sponds with the township as it exists in Michigan, Wisconsin, and many 
other Western states. The early New England settlers, as a rule, 
settled in groups, and that fact is important. Their houses were placed 
in the “home lots” that abutted on the main street, they were all, or 



62 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


97. Reasons for Group Settlements.— There were a good 
many reasons for this group method of settlement in New 
England. There were at the North no long branching rivers, 
as in Virginia, that formed natural highways to the interior; 
nor did tobacco growing tempt men to till large tracts of 
land. The intense interest in religious life led men to 
settle not far from the church. As early as 1635 a Massa¬ 
chusetts law ordered that no dwelling house should be 
built above half a mile from the meeting house on any new 
plantation. 

98. The Government of the Colony.—When John Win- 
throp came over from England as governor, bringing with 
him the charter of the company, it followed that the govern¬ 
ment of the company was transferred to Massachusetts. 
Its officers were here on the ground instead of being three 
thousand miles across the water * 1 ; here they might try to 
manage the settlements of which they were a part. Very 
few of the settlers were freemen, or, as we should say, mem¬ 
bers of the company; and yet the company had, by the char¬ 
ter, the title to the land and the right to govern all the rest of 
the people. Intent as the leaders were in their purpose of 
building up a “ Bible commonwealth,” they did not insist on 
keeping all power in their hands, but admitted others as free¬ 
men and thus widened the membership of the company. In 
order to be certain, however, that the purposes of the com¬ 
pany were not destroyed, it was declared that no one should 
be admitted to membership unless he were a church member. 
Thus, Massachusetts remained for years what the founders 
designed it to be, a Puritan community, guarded and watched 


nearly all, within easy reach of the church and the school. But a 
person might be a member of the town though he lived some distance 
away from the hamlet. He would still have his say about the com¬ 
mons and the bridges, and he would help to lay the taxes and choose 
the selectmen, who guarded the interests of the town when the town 
meeting was not in session. 

1 As the officers of the Virginia Company had been. 



THE FOUNDING OF MASSACHUSETTS BAY 63 

over by the clergy, the religious teachers, and sturdy church¬ 
men. 

99. Representation.—To make the rules governing a body 
of business men suit the needs of a commonwealth or politi¬ 
cal body was a matter of some trouble. At first a large part 
of the business was done by the governor and assistants, but 
soon after the increase in the membership of the company a 
system of representation was devised. 1 Henceforth laws 
were passed by the general court composed of the governor, 
assistants, and two deputies from each town. 2 

100. A Stray Fig—and a Legislature.—In 1644 a dispute 
arose over a very trivial matter. A poor widow and a rich 
man each claimed the ownership of a stray pig. The widow 
was quite as sure that the pig was hers as the rich man was 
that the pig belonged to him. The people took sides; and 
when the matter came before the legislature the deputies, 
on the whole, sided with the widow; the assistants voted the 
other way. The pig controversy finally broke the legisla¬ 
ture, or general court, into two houses 3 —the deputies and 
assistants—and thus made it resemble the British Parlia¬ 
ment, with its Lords and Commons, to which all English¬ 
men were used. 

101. The Bible Commonwealth Has no Patience with 
Frivolity.—Amid all the trials of building homes in the 
wilderness and making laws for their needs, the leaders of 

1 Watertown, when taxed without representation, had declared that 
they did not wish to pay money thus, “lest it bring them and their 
children into bondage.” 

2 Of course the people who had the right to vote in the town for 
representatives were those admitted to membership in the company, 
and these must be church members. 

3 In the colonies of which we shall study there came to be, in general, 
two houses, and in this way the colonists were preparing the way for the 
forms of our state governments. There is a story told of Washington’s 
pouring his tea from cup to saucer to cool it and saying that the action 
illustrated the value of two houses in a legislature. Do you see what 
he meant? 



64 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


Massachusetts did not forget their purpose to found a Bible 
Commonwealth. The ministers and religious teachers were 
the most influential men in the colony, and the churches were 



The Pillory and Stocks 
Used by the colonists to punish even slight offenses. 



supported by taxation. The laws were often founded upon 
the Bible, a book which men studied with sacred earnestness. 
Display in dress appeared to many as dangerous and dreadful, 
and even mirth was often frowned upon. Regulations were 

made against 
wearing lace, 
against short 
sleeves and 
slashed doub¬ 
lets. One wom¬ 
an was deeply 
affected because 
The Ducking Stool a certain good 

It was the custom to tie “common scolds” into this burl V,i <5 

chair and dip them repeatedly in the water. 

band “some¬ 
thing stiffened with starch.” 1 And yet we must not suppose 
that all were sinless and upright. Crime was not uncommon, 


1 In Plymouth a maidservant “was threatened with banishment from 
the colony as a common vagrant.” Her crime was that she had smiled 
in church. 























1 In April, 1634, John Lee was whipped for calling Mr. Ludlowe 
“false hearted knave.” Notice that Ludlowe was a “Mr.” and doubt¬ 
less Lee but a common “goodman” of a lower social rank. In 1633 
another man was fined £10 for drunkenness and ordered to stand with 
a white sheet of paper pinned to his back with “Drunkard” written on 
it. This did not cure him, for the next year we find that he was forced 
to wear the letter “D” about his neck for a twelvemonth. 


THE FOUNDING OF MASSACHUSETTS BAY 65 

though the guilty were punished severely. The whipping 
post and the branding iron were in frequent use. 1 

102. The People Become Congregationalists.—When they 
left England the Puritans that settled Boston were not 
Separatists like the Pilgrims; but after a time they practically 


From the oldest known print of Harvard College; engraved in 1726. 

gave up connection with the English Church and took the 
name Congregational. Each little body of believers man¬ 
aged its own affairs without directions from any superior 
body. But the church and state affairs were long connected, 
for the people wished a Puritan state, and the leaders did not 
hesitate to make life uncomfortable for those who held beliefs 
not in accord with their own. 















66 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


103. Common Schools; Harvard College.—The Puritan 

faith was based upon the Bible, and the men of New England 
desired a learned ministry to explain the Scriptures to the peo¬ 
ple. When the scholars that had come from England died, 
there must be others to fill their places. Since it was a de¬ 
vice of “ that old deluder Satan to keep men from the knowl¬ 
edge of the Scriptures ” by “ persuading them from the use of 
tongues/’ it was decided to found a college where young men 
could be educated. The Puritan fathers voted money from 
the public funds to start a college (1636). Two years later 
John Harvard in his will left the half of his estate, less than 
£500, and all his library for this purpose. Other gifts fol¬ 
lowed; the state gave one year’s rent of a ferry, and at one 
time each family gave a peck of corn. The college w r as 
named Harvard and grew to be one of the world’s greatest uni¬ 
versities. Moreover, a law was early passed ordering that in 
every village of fifty families there must be a school to teach 
reading and writing, and in every town of one hundred families 
a schoolmaster must be hired to teach a grammar school. 1 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: Brooks, Stories of the Old Bay State. Drake, Making 
of New England, 155-160, 172-184, 214-218. Coffin, Old Times in 
the Colonies, 152-170. Fiske, Beginnings of New England. Eggles¬ 
ton, Beginners of the Nation. 

Sources: Hart, American History Told by Contemporaries, I, 190- 
199, 366-382. 


CHAPTER X 

RHODE ISLAND AND CONNECTICUT.—THE 
CONFEDERATION 

104. Roger Williams, an Uneasy Reformer.—Plymouth 

and the Massachusetts Bay Colony had been founded by 

1 This making education a matter of law is of much interest in the 
light of the fact that now the great majority of pupils in America are in 
public schools. 




RHODE ISLAND AND CONNECTICUT 


67 


people fleeing from persecution. New colonies were soon 
started in New England by those who could not get on hap¬ 
pily with the Puritans of the Bay Colony. Discord was 


started by Roger Williams, a lovable, pure-hearted young 



man, who was very fond of speaking his mind. He 
disputed with the Puritan rulers, asserting that church and 
state ought to be separate, that 
the civil rulers had no right to 
punish men w T ho did not obey 
the church. 1 He argued, too, 
that all laws compelling men to 
attend church should be repealed. 

The power of the civil officers 
should reach only the bodies and 
goods of men, he said, and not 
their thoughts and beliefs. If 
these things were to be allowed 
there would be entire freedom 
of worship, toleration of all 
religious beliefs. 

105. Roger Williams is Ban¬ 
ished.—Sensible as toleration 
seems to us to-day, it is no won¬ 
der that the Massachusetts rulers 
were alarmed at Williams’ ideas. 

A man of the seventeenth century 
said, “It is Satan’s policy to plead 
for an indefinite and boundless 
toleration,” and that was the 
general thought of his age. In no country in the world at 
that time, except perhaps Holland, could a man safely talk 


Copyright, Detroit Photographic Co. 

Monument to Roger 
Williams 
Providence, R. I. 


1 Almost nothing but church-going was allowed on Sunday and 
Sabbath-breaking was a grave offense punished by the civil officers. 
By the old way of reckoning, Sabbath began with sunset on Saturday 
and ended with sunset on Sunday. For twenty-four hours all was 
quiet. 





































68 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 

as Williams talked. In Spain he would have been burned at 
the stake; in England the pillory or a prison, and the loss of 
the offender’s ears would have been his punishment. 

Besides, the daring young minister did not stop with a plea 
for toleration, but at a time when the king was talking of 
seizing the colony’s charter, Williams declared that “ King 
James had told a solemn public lie ” by saying in the colony’s 
charter that he had discovered the lands that he was grant¬ 
ing. It was a sin, he said, to take the lands from the king, 
they should instead buy them of the Indians. 

The rulers of Massachusetts, therefore, partly to prevent 
heresy from rising in their midst and partly to save the col¬ 
ony from the king’s anger, 
resolved that Williams must 
leave. Not wishing to be 
sent to England, he fled to 
the woods (1636), where he 
wandered for fourteen weeks 
in a bitter winter season, 
“not knowing,” as he tells 
us, “ what bread or meat 
did mean.” 

106. Providence is 
Founded.—A few miles 
south of the line of the 
Massachusetts colony Wil¬ 
liams “ bought ” 1 some land 
of the Indians. There with 
four companions he founded the town of Providence. Here, 
he said, everyone should worship God as he or she saw fit. 
Providence should be a refuge for the “ most Jewish, Pagan, 
and anti-Christian consciences.” Its government was a 

1 H 2 did not know the Indian custom of letting lands for a season, 
and he was much surprised later when the Indian sachems came to his 
trading post and took his goods. He did not understand that they were 
only taking more pay for the continued use of their lands. 














RHODE ISLAND AND CONNECTICUT 


69 


simple democracy where the majority ruled. It had power 
only in civil, not in religious matters. For this principle, 
which has become one of the rocks in the foundation of our 
republic, Roger Williams, the “ champion of soul liberty,” 
should be forever remembered. 

107. A Woman of Nimble Wit.—Soon there came from 
Massachusetts other exiles, Anne Hutchinson and her follow¬ 
ers. The leader, a woman “of a nimble wit and active 
spirit” had also been teaching strange doctrines in Boston, 
doctrines so vague, indeed, that the most acute minds can 
scarcely understand them to-day. So tactful had she been, 
however, that she had won the love of many, and the church 
was divided into factions for and against her. But the hos¬ 
tile rulers overcame and banished her. 

108. Providence Plantations.—Anne Hutchinson drew 
with her to Rhode Island some of the best people of Massa¬ 
chusetts. With the aid of Williams they got, for “ forty 
fathoms of white beads,” the island of Aquidneck, or Rhode 
Island (1637-38). There they founded two towns, Ports¬ 
mouth at the north and Newport at the south. After a few 
years, as a result of Williams’ efforts in London, these settle¬ 
ments and Providence were allowed to unite as the Providence 
Plantations. Their liberal charter permitted the people to 
rule themselves by such a government “as by the voluntary 
consent of all or the greatest part of them shall be found 
most serviceable to their estate and condition.” 

109. Williams Draws the Line between Freedom and 
Anarchy.—The great freedom allowed in the new colony drew 
to it man}' men of strange ideas about government as well as 
religion. Some wanted their own way in everything, and 
Williams had to show them where liberty ceased to be a vir¬ 
tue and became a danger. “A true picture of a common¬ 
wealth,” he wrote, “is a ship at sea, with many hundred 
souls . . . whose weal and woe is common.” These might 
be Catholics, Jews, Turks, and Protestants, and none should 
be driven to come to the ship’s prayers or kept from their 


70 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


own. But the captain of the ship ought to direct its course, 
make the seamen work, and the passengers pay their fare. 
He could not allow men to preach and write that there ought 
to be no officers, no laws or orders. Those who thus endan¬ 
ger the welfare of all the people, the commander should judge 
and punish. Thus admirably Williams drew the line between 
religious freedom and political anarchy. 

110. A “Hankering Mind” for the Fertile Valley.—We 
have seen Roger Williams and Anne Hutchinson driven out 
of Massachusetts; but there were others that did not like the 
close union of church and state, nor the intolerant rulers who 
allowed only church members to vote. Moreover, many 
“ had a hankering mind ” after the fertile Connecticut val¬ 
leys. Beginning with the year of Williams’ banishment (1635) 
numerous people from Dorchester, Watertown, and Newton 
settled Windsor, Wethersfield, and Hartford. Overland, 
through the forests they went with their wives, children, and 
household goods. Mrs. Hooker, the wife of the eloquent 
preacher, one of the leaders of the migration, was carried in a 
horse litter. 

111. The Westward Movement, 1635.—Her party drove 
160 cattle “ and fed on their milk by the way.” They were 
the first of those pilgrims toward the setting sun who later 
were to be numbered by the millions, and who were to carry 
English speech and English habits over mountains and plains 
and river valleys to the edge of the Pacific over three thou¬ 
sand miles away. The never-ceasing search for fertile lands, 
easy to buy, has been one of the main causes of our country’s 
growth. 

112. The “Fundamental Orders.”—Thomas Hooker, the 
leader of the migration to Hartford, had political ideas that 
stood midway between those of Winthrop and Williams. He 
thought that “ a general council chosen by all ” should do the 
business which concerns all. In harmony with his views the 
settlers of the three towns drew up and adopted (1638-39) 
the “ Fundamental Orders.” The form of government thus 


RHODE ISLAND AND CONNECTICUT 


71 


provided for was much like that of Massachusetts, but the 
right to vote did not depend on church membership. These 
Orders have been called “ the first truly political written con¬ 
stitution in history.” Perhaps it is not exactly right to call 
them a constitution at all; certainly they differ much from 
our modern constitutions. But this was the first time in his- 



Extent of the Settlements in New England in 1660 


tory that men had planned a government for themselves and 
put in writing the main principles and methods of govern¬ 
ment. 

113. New Haven; the Connecticut Charter, 1662.—While 
the three Connecticut towns were providing for civil govern¬ 
ment, a new colony was being formed on Long Island Sound, 
whose sheltered shore had harbors which early invited set¬ 
tlements. The most important of these settlements was 













72 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


New Haven, to which came John Davenport and a company 
of London merchants (1638). 1 In 1662 the towns on the Con¬ 
necticut got a charter from the king and the New Haven 
colony found itself joined with them. Together they 
formed the colony of Connecticut. Under the charter 
the people were self-governing. They managed their own 
affairs and chose their own officers. The charter appeared 
so good to them and so well suited to their needs that 
they kept and lived by its terms for one hundred and fifty 
years. 

114. New Hampshire and Maine: Wilderness Settle¬ 
ments.— North of Massachusetts were formed little set¬ 
tlements that later became New Hampshire and Maine. 
People went to those northern wilds from the older New 
England colony, some because they did not like the laws 
and the church government of Massachusetts, others that 
they might get new farms or found little fishing villages, 
whence they might go out upon the sea to catch cod and 
mackerel. 

115. The New England Confederation.—The Connecticut 
settlements were from the first annoyed by the Indians. In 
1636 a real war broke out with the Pequot Indians. One 
hundred Connecticut and Massachusetts soldiers went against 
them, surprised them in their fort, and but five out of four 
hundred Indians escaped the shots of the white men and the 
burning wigwams. That tribe was utterly destroyed; but 
the Indian danger still remained. There was danger, more¬ 
over, that the French might come from Canada to attack 
the outlying settlements on the Hudson. Dutch fur traders, 
too, had settled along the Hudson, trading with the Indians, 
and trying to keep the Englishmen out of the Connecticut 
valley. Against these dangers the English king could give 
his colonists little aid. To protect themselves, therefore, 
against these dangers, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Plym- 

1 In 1635, a fort, Saybrook, had been erected at the mouth of the 
Connecticut to keep the fur trade from the Dutch. 



RHODE ISLAND AND CONNECTICUT 73 

outh, and New Haven formed (1643) a “ firm and perpetual 
league of friendship.” 1 

116. King Philip’s War. All of the resources of this union 
were needed, when (1675) “ King Philip,” a famous Indian 
chief, tried to destroy the English settlements and thus save 
his hunting grounds. After two years of desperate strug¬ 
gle, Philip was slain, and the Indian power was forever 
broken in that region. 

117. New England Colonies Not Members of Confedera¬ 
tion.— Several parts of New England were not asked to take 
part in the Confederation. The Puritan leaders would have 
no more to do with Rhode Island “ than necessity or human¬ 
ity may require.” They felt somewhat the same toward the 
new colonies which had been formed to the north. The Puri¬ 
tans of Massachusetts, though they later made Maine a part 
of their province, now scorned union with it, because one 
poor village had made a tailor its mayor, and had allowed a 
man once driven from Massachusetts to become its minister. 
Rhode Island and New Hampshire were not taken into the 
Confederation. 

118. The Foreshadowing of Union.—The perpetual league 
of friendship lasted for forty years. Much of the time it had 
little to do, but it doubtless gave the colonies confidence, and 
ic strengthened them against the Dutch and the Indians. 
This simple union has some slight resemblance to our present 
great union of states. We always look back upon it, there¬ 
fore, with interest. Perhaps we can say that this feeble con¬ 
federation was a promise of the greater, stronger union to 
come in later days, when trouble and danger threatened 
the colonies of the continent. 

119. The Quakers Are Punished.—In some ways the most 
painful story in the history of early New England is the story 
of how Massachusetts treated the Quakers. The Puritans 
believed that these people were bad and lawless, and statutes 

1 After New Haven was made part of Connecticut, there were, of 
course, but three members of the league. 



74 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


were passed against them, forbidding them to come into the 
colony or providing for their banishment. Though some of 
the early Quakers were, as we should say, “ queer ” and foolish 
in their actions, the sect as a whole simply preached that each 
man should follow his own conscience. But Massachusetts 
would have none of them or their preaching. Some of them 
were punished, and thereafter went away and stayed away. 
Others refused to keep out of the colony and four of them 
were hanged (1660). One of these was a woman, Ma^ Dyer. 
At the very gallows she was offered her release if she would 
stay away from Massachusetts, but she bravely said: “In 
obedience to the will of the Lord I came, and in His will I 
abide faithful to the death.” 

120. Massachusetts Grows Weary of Cruelty.—This could 
not go on; the people had had enough of the gallows, and the 
persecution stopped. New England had seen the end of 
putting men to death for such reasons as brought punishment 
to the Quakers. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: Fasett, Colonial Life in New Hampshire. Eggleston, 
Beginners of the Nation, 212-215, 316-326. Drake, Making of New 
England, 241-243. Fiske, Beginnings of New England, 122-128, 134- 
137. Fisher, Colonial Era, 123-132. Wright, Stories of American 
History, 267-291. Pratt, Early Colonies. 

Sources: Old South Leaflets, Nos. 8, 93. Hart, Source Book, 52- 
54. Hart, American History Told by Contemporaries, I, 414-415, 
430-434. 

Fiction: Hawthorne, Grandfather’s Chair, 27, 28. 


CHAPTER XI 

NEW NETHERLAND, DELAWARE, AND NEW JERSEY 

121. Holland, a Small but Powerful Nation.—We must 

now go back some years to see the rise of a colony planted by 
the Dutch nation. While England was building up two 
strong centers of colonization, one in Virginia and the other 
in New England, Holland was seeking to establish settle- 


NEW NETHERLAND, DELAWARE, AND NEW JERSEY 75 


ments on the Hudson and the Delaware, and, indeed, to 
occupy the country at least as far east as the Connecticut. 
Holland was then a strong and sturdy 
nation. The Dutch sailors had shown 
great bravery in fighting Spain; and 
now, in the early part of the seven¬ 
teenth century, Holland was a sea 
power strong enough to be respected 
by all nations. Holding the little 
corner of western Europe, much of 
which she had wrested from the sea, 
she sent out her fleets of merchantmen 
to carry the trade of Europe. 

122. Henry Hudson.—From Am¬ 
sterdam, the great Dutch commercial 
city, the merchant ships went to every 
sea, but the chief source of the merchants’ wealth was the 
East Indies. The way there lay through seas guarded by 
the Portuguese, who claimed the sole right to use the pas¬ 
sage around the Cape of Good Hope, because they first 
discovered it. The Dutch East India Company sent 
Henry Hudson, an English sailor, to find a shorter and less 

dangerous route by 
which they might 
bring home from 
India their silks and 
gems and spices. 
In his famous ship, 
the Half Moon , he 
tried first to go 
around the north of 
Europe, but dis¬ 
couraged by ice and 
storm, he turned 
westward toward 
America. Touch- 



The Half Moon in the Hudson River 



Flag of the Dutch 
East India Com¬ 
pany 

The stripes were, in or¬ 
der, from the top, yel¬ 
low, white, and blue. 















































76 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


ing first the coast of Maine, he sailed south to the Chesa¬ 
peake, thence north to the Delaware River; and in August 
of 1609 he entered what is now New York Harbor. 

123. Hudson Sails Up the Great River.—The mighty 
river which flowed from the north seemed to offer a route to 
the East. The discoverer sailed eagerly up the stream, ad¬ 
miring the beaut}' of the Palisades and the Catskills. 1 It 
was not strange that he thought this a passage to the western 
ocean, for the water was salt a great distance up the river 
and the tide flowed as far as the present site of Albany- 
There, where the water freshened, he stopped, and returned 
to Holland 2 to tell of the “ River of Mountains,” and, what 
the merchants cared more about, that furs could be bought 
there for beads, knives, and other trinkets. 

124. The Dutch Company Wants Fur and Sets up Trad¬ 
ing Posts.—To the Dutch East India Company Hudson’s 
voyage seemed a failure, but other merchants were attracted 
by the talk of furs. In Europe, at that time, onl}' very rich 
men, kings and dukes and bishops, could buy furs, so great 
was their cost. The Indians of America, on the other hand, 
who killed fur-bearing animals, the beaver and otter, on 
almost every hunt, were ready to sell beautiful skins for a few 
beads or trinkets. Dutch merchants began to send ships to 
the great new river, and they set up forts or trading posts, 
built of logs—one on Manhattan Island, called Fort Amster¬ 
dam, and one where Albany now is, called Fort Orange. In 
1621 the Dutch West India Company was formed with a 
charter from the Holland Government. 3 This company car- 

1 Hudson, clad in a red coat, gold-laced, had a formal meeting with 
the Indians on Manhattan Island and offered brandy to them. One 
who drank was staggered by the “strong water,” as he called it. Alcohol 
proved to be poison to the Indians, and in later years more Indians, 
perhaps, died from its effects than from the guns of white men. 

2 Hudson came later to America under an English flag. In Hudson 
Bay his men turned him adrift and he perished in the cold and ice. 

3 Its chief object was to loot the Spanish treasure ships as they re¬ 
turned from the West Indies. 




NEW NETHERLAND, DELAWARE, AND NEW JERSEY 77 

ried on trade with Indians along the North and South rivers, 
as they called the Hudson and the Delaware. In 1626 
their governor 1 “ bought,” for a few dollars’ worth of brass 
buttons, ribbons, and red cloth, the island upon which New 
York City has grown, which now a billion dollars would 
not buy. There a little settlement grew up, known as 
New Amsterdam. 

125. New Netherland and the Patroons.—Among other 
things that the charter bound the company to do was to 



The Earliest Published View of New Amsterdam 


“ advance the peopling of those fruitful and unsettled parts ” 
known as New Netherland. 2 Traders did not come to set¬ 
tle for life but to make money to take home. The company 
planned, therefore, to send over farmers, who, being forbidden 
to deal in furs, would settle upon the land and cultivate 
it. But there must be some plan to tempt them to come. 


1 See p. 68 (note), where Indian sales of land are explained. 

2 Netherland was another name for Holland, and just as New Eng¬ 
land was named after old England, so New Netherland got its name. 















































































78 THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 

Such a plan was made. Vast estates were given to men 
who would bring over colonists. 1 

Over this land the patroon, as the owner was called , had the 
right to rule, and to share in what his tenants produced. 
At once certain rich men hastened to take advantage of this 
tempting offer. And, as years went on, large estates arose on 
the banks of the Hudson. The patroon’s big house, with its 
decorated rooms and its European furniture, told of his 


A Patroon’s House on the Hudson 

wealth. From the plainer houses of his tenants there came 
each year on “ rent day ” a long line of farmers with wagon¬ 
loads of produce, the share of the patroon. A great feast 
was prepared, where all ate and drank, and then they turned 
home to toil for another year. Most fortunate of all the 


1 Anyone who would take fifty colonists to New Netherland and 
pay the costs, should be given lands extending 16 miles along one side 
of the Hudson River (or 8 miles on both sides) running back as far 
“as the situation will admit.” The patroon, as the owner was 
called, must provide horses, cattle, and tools, and furnish a school¬ 
master and minister. 















NEW NET1IERLAND, DELAWARE, AND NEW JERSEY 79 

patroons was one Van Rensselaer, a diamond merchant, 
whose lands about Fort Orange made his descendants rich 
and powerful. 

126. Delaware, a Swedish Colony.—Patroons settled on 



the Delaware as well as on the Hudson River. Here, how¬ 
ever, the settlers quarreled with the Indians and were 
massacred. Disgusted with the lack of protection given by 












80 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


the Dutch Company, some enterprising men formed a new 
company and sought a charter from Sweden instead of Hol¬ 
land. It had been the wish of Gustavus Adolphus, the hero 
king of Sweden, to have an American colony, and soon after 
his death a charter was granted by the Swedish Government. 
In 1638 the company sent ships and men, who built a fort on 
the Delaware 1 and called the country New Sweden. The 
Dutch at first did not oppose the Swedish colony, but after a 
time the Dutch governor of New York came with more armed 
men than there were men, women, and children in New 
Sweden and seized the Swedish colony. Thus ended 
Sweden’s attempt to colonize America. 

127. Kieft and Stuyvesant, Greedy and Cruel.—Though 
the Dutch thus took New Sweden, their own colony was 
weak. The Dutch West India Company took interest in 
nothing but money making, and did not build up the colony 
as it might have done. The governors in charge of the col¬ 
ony were far from wise. First there was Governor Kieft, a 
bankrupt and a thief, and he made trouble enough; and then 
Peter Stuyvesant, with his silver-bound wooden leg and 
his frightful temper, took Kieft’s place. Though he was hon¬ 
est, “Old Silverleg” was also headstrong. He ruled like a 
tyrant, used the gallows and whipping post, and would not 
listen to the idea of the people’s electing their own officers. 2 
“The thief will vote for a thief and the smuggler for a smug¬ 
gler,” he declared. 3 Many English settlers had come to live 
among the Dutch, and they greatly increased the number of 
those who hated this despotic rule. 


1 Where Wilmington now is. The fort was named Christina in 
honor of Sweden’s queen. 

2 He finally had to allow a “Council of Nine,” but he ran the council, 
and cowed them by stamping his wooden leg. 

3 In some ways he was a good governor. He built for New Amster¬ 
dam’s defense a high wall or palisade, where Wall Street is to-day. 
The lane to his farm, or “bowery,” is to-day a great street in New 
York City. 



NEW NETHERLAND, DELAWARE, AND NEW JERSEY 81 

128. New Netherland Becomes New York.—Though the 
Dutch had forts and a good trade in the Connecticut 
Valley, the New Englanders were too strong for them and 
they were finally forced quite out of that region. The Dutch 
had a fort at Hartford, but the English cut them off from the 
sea by building a fort at Saybrook at the mouth of the Con¬ 
necticut River. The more the Englishman gained, the more 



Peter Stuyvesant’s House in New Amsterdam 
This house was erected in 1658 and was afterward called the White Hall. 
From an old print in Valentine’s Manual. 


he wanted. In 1664 an English fleet appeared before New 
Amsterdam demanding its surrender. 1 The means for de¬ 
fense were so poor, and so many of the people were glad to 
get relief from Stuyvesant’s rule, that the governor, after 
swearing he would fight as long as he had “ a leg to stand on,” 

1 They claimed the whole coast on the ground that the Cabots had 
discovered it for the English king. 






















82 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


yielded to the pleading citizens and ran up the white flag. 
The King of England had already given the colony to the 
Duke of York (later King James II), and New Amsterdam, 
together with the rest of New Netherland, then became 
New York. 1 Thus, by 1664, only English settlements were 
found from the Bay of Fundy to the southern line of Vir¬ 
ginia. 

129. The New Government. — The English conquerors 

promised New Amsterdam a better government, and without 
making great changes in the old Dutch customs, they kept 
their promise. The new governor, !N icholls, called together 
men of the Long Island towns (1665) and talked over a new 
code of laws—“ The Duke’s Laws.” Under this code, town 
meetings were to be held for the election of town officers. 
This system grew until after a time the towns were repre¬ 
sented in a board of county supervisors or tax layers, who 
looked after the money matters of the several towns in the 
county. 2 Though all of the other English colonies had rep¬ 
resentative self-government, New York had none until 1683, 
when at last a new governor, Thomas Dongan, brought news 
that the Duke of York had consented; and thereupon a colo¬ 
nial assembly was called. On the whole, however, the English 
treated their Dutch colonists well. The Dutch kept their 
own dress and habits, and remained the largest land own¬ 
ers; their trading and farming flourished. Although there 
came men from other nations with other tongues, other cus¬ 
toms, and other faiths, yet the steady Dutch ways ruled 
in New York for many years. 

130. The Settlement of New Jersey. —When the Dutch 
flag came down and the English flag went up on Fort Am- 


1 This seizure of New Netherland was followed by a war between 
England and Holland. At its end England ceded some East India 
islands to Holland and kept New Netherland. 

2 We have, therefore, in New York, something like a mixture of 
the New England system of local government based upon the township 
with the Virginia or Southern system based upon the county. 



NEW NETHERLAND, DELAWARE, AND NEW JERSEY 83 

sterdam, the Duke of Y ork became the owner of Long Island, 
of all the country from the western line of Connecticut to the 
sources of the Hudson, the Mohawk, and the Delaware rivers, 
as well as of all the region that is now Delaware and New 
Jersey. The duke at _._ - 



once gave to his friends 
Lord Berkeley and Sir 
George Carteret a large 
piece of his land, which 
was thereupon called 
New Jersey, because 
Carteret had been the 
loyal governor of the 
Isle of Jersey in the 
English Channel. In a 
few years (1674) some 
Friends, or Quakers, 
bought Berkeley’s share, 
which came to be called 
West Jersey, and later 
William Penn and a 
company of Quakers, 
and some Presbyterians 
from Scotland, bought 
East Jersey. After a 


The Hudson River, Delaware, and 
Pennsylvania Settlements 


period of quarreling over 

the ownership of the land, the two Jerseys were united 
(1702) and ruled by a governor appointed by the king. 

131. The Characteristics of New Jersey.—A few colonists, 
Swedes and Dutch, were already in New Jersey when that 
region was granted to the Duke of York. More settlers were 
tempted to come by the rich soil, and by the religious freedom 
and liberal government promised by Berkeley and Carteret 
in a paper known as the “ Concessions.” When the Quakers 
were in control they “ put the power in the people ” to govern 
themselves, “ that they may not be brought into bondage 












84 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


but by their own consent.” As a sober farming colony, New 
Jersey grew steadily and prospered, but there was in its his¬ 
tory a good deal of wrangling, due perhaps to the number of 
different nationalities and religious sects. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: Todd, History of New York City. Stockton, Stories of 
New Jersey. Southworth, The Story of the Empire State. Fiske, 
Dutch and Quaker Colonies, I, 82-94, 133-137, 198-201. Anderson 
and Flick, History of New York. Coffin, Old Times in the Colonies, 
195-233, 291-293. Wright, Stories of American History, 292-299. 
Drake, Making of Virginia and the Middle Colonies, 108-145. Wil¬ 
liams, Stories from Early New York History. 

Sources: Hart, American History Told by Contemporaries, I, Nos. 
155, 38, 153, 157. Hart, Source Book, 62-67. 

Fiction: Irving, Rip Van Winkle. 


CHAPTER XII 

THE QUAKER COLONY: PENNSYLVANIA 

132. Quakers Interested in Colonizing—We have seen 
that the members of the Society of Friends, or the Quakers, 
were interested in the settlement of New Jersey. We have 
now to study the history of another colony, founded by the 
greatest member of this sect. Let us see first who the Quak¬ 
ers were and something of what they believed. 

133. George Fox, the Founder of a Religious Sect.— 
The founder of the Society of Friends was George Fox, who in 
his youth had been a simple shoemaker’s apprentice. As a 
mere boy he became worried about the safety of his soul. 
Many sects with many priests and ministers pointed out so 
many different ways of salvation that they only confused the 
simple lad. Finally the thought came to him that it was not 
learning that led men to heaven, but the “ inner light ” that 
was given to every man from on high. Preachers were not 
needed, he thought, for this “ voice of God in the soul ” told 
each man the truth; this light shone in every man’s breast. 


THE QUAKER COLONY: PENNSYLVANIA 


85 


He believed that since every one was guided from on high, 
all persons must be equal in the sight of their Maker. Fox 
began to preach his beliefs, and thousands followed him. 

134. William Penn Becomes a Quaker.—Of all the 
Quakers, William Penn is the most famous. He was the son 
of an admiral of the British navy. As a boy he was given 
every advantage of education. He spoke several languages, 
danced well, rode well, and was 
a fine swordsman. 1 In fact, he 
was trained to be a courtier, but 
to his proud father’s chagrin, re¬ 
ports came from Oxford, where 
the boy was at college, that Wil¬ 
liam Penn had become a Quaker, 
and that he refused to attend 
the church service. The father 
could think only of the outward 
oddities of this sect, and of their 
refusal to doff the hat even to a 
king, 2 and their habit of saying 
thee and thou instead of you. An 
effort to tempt young Penn to give up his religion and to 
act like other people of his class was in vain; his father 
at last made up his mind to rest content, and when he died 

e left a fortune to his son. 

135. The Quakers Love Peace and Teach Kindness.—The 

Quakers had many great ideas that came from their belief in 

1 At one time when he was a young man, living in Paris, he was at¬ 
tacked in the street at night by a man, sword in hand, who demanded 
apology for some fancied insult. Penn drew his own sword, promptly 
disarmed his opponent, and then with graciousness gave his foe his life. 

2 The story is told that once, when William Penn was in the presence 
of Charles II, he did not take off his hat as a good courtier should do 
in the presence of a king. Charles, bright and witty as usual, imme¬ 
diately put off his own hat. “Why dost thou put off thy hat, friend 
Charles?” said the Quaker. “Because,” answered the king, “when 
two of us are together, only one remains covered.” 



William Penn 





86 THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 

the worth of the man, be he rich or poor. In an age when 
men were hanged for small thefts, the Friends urged a milder 
penalty. Instead of trying to cure insane persons by beat¬ 
ing and starving them, as was often done, Penn urged that 
there be hospitals and kind treatment for them. The casting 
into prison of men who could not pay their debts, a custom 
which was then practiced everywhere, he thought was wrong. 
At a time when prisons were made as horrible as possible, and 
idle convicts spent their time learning more evil from their 
fellows, Penn urged that work be provided for them. He 
even urged the almost unheard-of plan that war be avoided 
by peaceful arbitration. Thus, under the oddities of the 
Quaker sect we may see some very noble ideas, full of prom¬ 
ise for the future. 

136. Penn Gets Pennsylvania, 1681.—To advance these 
great ideas, Penn decided to establish in America a colony 
where they might be tried. He accepted, instead of money 
which King Charles II owed him, a vast tract of wild forest 
land stretching westward from the Delaware. 1 From James, 
the Duke of York, he later got the Swedish Dutch settle¬ 
ments on Delaware Bay, that he might have sure access to 
the sea. 2 For the government of the tract of land granted 
by King Charles, a charter was issued to Penn. Pennsylva¬ 
nia (meaning “ Penn’s Woodland ”), as the king called it to 
honor Penn’s father, was to be Penn’s property, and over th 


1 Its boundaries were about the same as those of the present state 
of Pennsylvania, but as to the location of the southern boundary there 
was a long dispute with the owners of Maryland. In 1763-67 two 
surveyors, Mason and Dixon, surveyed and located it where it now is. 
Later this line (known as “ Mason and Dixon’s Line”) became famous, 
because it separated the free and the slave states. 

2 Delaware was not provided for in the charter, and later there 
was much trouble between its colonists and the proprietor. In 1703 
Delaware became independent of Pennsylvania, taking its laws from a 
separate legislature, though the two colonies had the same governor 
until 1776. 



THE QUAKER COLONY: PENNSYLVANIA 


87 


men that might settle there he had much power for good or 
evil. But, fortunately, Penn wanted to do good. 

137. Penn Wishes to Try a “Holy Experiment.”—There 
was little trouble in getting colonists, for Penn was one of the 
best known and trusted among the Quakers, and they were so 
bitterly persecuted everywhere that a refuge was most wel¬ 
come. 1 Penn’s plans for government, which by the terms of the 
charter he was empowered to create, especially allured them. 
Men were pleased, not so much by the form of government, as 
by the spirit in which Penn planned it. He wanted a just 
and righteous government that other states might copy. He 
would leave neither to himself nor his children the power of do¬ 
ing harm, for the will of one man, he said, ought not to hinder 
the good of a whole country. In his constitution or “Frame 
of Government,” therefore, Penn provided: (1) The govern¬ 
ment was for the benefit of the people, and should be man¬ 
aged by them. This was most generous, for Penn was the 
proprietor and owned all the land. (2) Freedom of con¬ 
science, or the right to worship God as one chose, should 
exist regardless of color, sect, or nationality. 

138. The City of Brotherly Love.—In addition to the mat¬ 
ter of government, Penn took great pains for the comfort of 
his colonists. Before the first colonists came, in 1681, he 
had men seek out along the Delaware the best place for a city, 
“where it is most navigable, dry, and healthy . . . where most 
ships may best ride.” A vast area was set aside for wide 
streets and large lots. Each house was to be “in the middle 
of its plat that it may be a green country town.” Soon was 


1 The Quakers would not pay taxes to support a religion against 
their conscience. They refused to take off their hats before judges or 
priests. They would not obey a law which prevented their free worship, 
and they refused oaths of allegiance, not believing in oaths. Hence, 
they drew upon them the hatred of judges and officers. Penn himself 
in his earlier days had often been thrust into prison. “The Tower,” 
he said, “is to me the worst argument in the world. My prison shall 
be my grave before I budge a jot.” 



88 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


begun the erection of the stately town of Philadelphia (which 
is the Greek for “ brotherly love whose convenient check¬ 
erboard plan has needed little change to this day. 

139. Penn Makes Peace with the Indians.—That the 
town and colony might not be plagued with Indians, Penn 
sent for the chiefs of that region—so tradition has it—and 
under a great elm, while smoking the pipe of peace, he bar¬ 
gained with them for the sale of a large tract of their land. 



The House in Philadelphia in which Penn Lived, 1699-1701 


To his agents Penn commanded : “ Be tender of offending the 
Indians. . . . Make a friendship and league with them.” As 
a result of this care, and the fortunate fact that the tribes of 
that region were not so fierce and warlike as those to the 
north, peace long reigned, and the Indians left the colony to 
grow unmolested. 

140. Welsh and German Settlers.—Freedom, safety, 
and prosperity all tempted men to come to Pennsylvania, 
and to this colony came not only Englishmen but men of 
other nations as well. Many of the early settlers were 













































































































































































THE QUAKER COLONY: PENNSYLVANIA 


89 


Welsh. 1 A year or two after the founding of the colony, 
there came from the Rhine country in Germany a company 
of Mennonites 2 led by their pastor, right-minded, hard-work¬ 
ing folk who welcomed the chance to live and work and wor¬ 
ship in a free land. They settled in Germantown, a little 
north of Penn’s new city. Greater migrations followed from 
other parts of the fatherland, until it must have seemed as if 
Pennsylvania was to be German and not English. 

141. The Hardy Scotch-Irish.—About the year 1700 the 
Scotch-Irish began to come to America, more coming to Penn¬ 
sylvania than elsewhere. 3 They and their children became 
the bold and resistless pioneers whom we shall see pushing ever 
deeper into the forests, and over mountains and plains, head¬ 
ing the march of American civilization to the Pacific Ocean. 
In Pennsylvania the greater number pressed on past Phila¬ 
delphia, past the German settlements, and on the Western 
frontier made homes for themselves in the woods. 

142. The Quakers and Education.—In a commonwealth 
where there was so much equality and regard for the poor 
man as in Pennsylvania, one would expect to find public 
schools, supported by taxes. In the schools, however, which 
were opened in Philadelphia when the city was not a year 
old 4 the parents had to pay four shillings a term for each 
child learning to read, and eight shillings if writing and arith¬ 
metic were added. No colleges like Harvard were founded. 

This difference from the New England school system was 
due to the differing beliefs of the Puritans and Quakers. The 
Puritans valued the learning to be obtained at college, because 
it would enable a man to understand every verse of the Bible. 


1 Notice the Welsh names on the map of Pennsylvania: Merion, 
Bryn Mawr, Radnor, Llanrwst. 

2 A sect opposed to taking oaths, to military service, and to infant 
baptism. They lived in communities and very simply. 

3 Fiske, in his “ Dutch and Quaker Colonies,” estimates that between 
1730 and 1770, 500,000 came to America. 

4 They were for boys and girls together, a new thing in those days. 



90 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


They must have ministers so trained that they could explain 
it to the less educated. The Quakers thought that a boy 
needed only to know how to read, for God would put in his 
heart the true meaning of all that he found in the Bible. 
The Quakers were in no hurry for colleges, therefore, but 
were satisfied with schools. They did, however, have a 
printing press two years after Penn’s coming, and in time 
published the first daily newspaper in the United States. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: Walton and Brumbaugh, Stories of Pennsylvania. Hodge, 
William Penn. Brooks, Century Book of the American Colonies. 
Fiske, Dutch and Quaker Colonies, II, 114-117, 147-152. Thwaites, 
Colonies, 215-217. Eggleston, Household History, 58-62. Dixon, 
William Penn. 

Sources: Liberty Bell Leaflets, Nos. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Hart, Amer¬ 
ican History Told by Contemporaries, I, 554-558. Hart, Source 
Readers, No. I, 49. 


CHAPTER XIII 

OTHER COLONIES IN THE SOUTH: MARYLAND, THE 

CAROLINAS, GEORGIA 

143. Lord Baltimore, Founder of Maryland.—Virginia was 
hardly well founded before another colony was established 
in the neighborhood. In 1632 Cecil Calvert, who had in¬ 
herited from his father, George Calvert, the title of Lord 
Baltimore and a large tract of land north of the Potomac 
River, made preparations to bring settlers to this province 
granted by the king to his father. By the terms of the 
charter which was given him, Baltimore was made Lord 
Proprietor; he was given not only the land but the right 
to rule over it; he was a sort of king in his American 
dominion. Though the English king gave so much land 
and so much power into Baltimore’s hands, there was one 
important check upon his power: he could make laws only 


SOUTHERN COLONIES 91 

with the consent of the freemen or landholders of the prov¬ 
ince. 1 

144. A Refuge for Roman Catholics, — Lord Baltimore 
had many reasons for wishing to found a new colony; cer¬ 
tainly one of them was to give refuge to Roman Catholics, 
for he was of that faith himself and must have had much 
compassion for his fellow-churchmen. At that time, in 
England, those that did not worship by the forms of the 
Church of England were in danger of punishment.. Roman 
Catholics were fined, cast into loathsome prisons, and even 
tortured; no one might attend a Roman Catholic school or 
read a Roman Catholic book; no one holding that faith was 
allowed to own a sword or gun, hold a public office, or, when 
dead, be buried in the parish churchyard. 

145. The Voyage of the Ark and the Dove. —In 1633 over 
200 men and women set sail in the Ark and the Dove for Bal¬ 
timore’s new colony, which was named Maryland in honor 
of Queen Henrietta Maria, the w r ife of King Charles of Eng¬ 
land. Of these colonists some were Protestant and some 
were Catholic; but the voyage was passed without unseemly 
quarrels, and together they began at the little place they 
called St. Mary’s, the founding of a new commonwealth 
(1634). Toleration of different religions thus grew up in 
Maryland as the custom of the land; and a few years after 
the first settlement the colonists passed the famous Toler¬ 
ation Act (1649), which permitted freedom of worship to all. 
It marks a great step in the history of peaceful living in 


1 We have sem that Virginia was founded by a company, and that 
from 1624 on, the king appointed the governor. That is to say, in 1624 
Virginia became a royal colony. Now in Maryland we find one man in 
charge; the king by a charter gave him power. So we call Maryland 
a proprietary colony. There were other proprietary colonies New 
York under James, Duke of York, and Pennsylvania, as well as others. 
In the Carolinas, of which we shall presently speak, there were a 
number of proprietors, who for a time held the colonists and tried to 
rule them. 





92 THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 

this world—this readiness of men to respect one another’s 
beliefs. 1 

146. The People Gradually Gain Power.—Though Balti¬ 
more had much power, he could not, as we have seen, make 
laws without the consent of the colonists. It was, therefore, 
necessary for him to call an assembly, and thus ere long a 



The outer dotted line shows the original boundary and the inner line 
shows the boundary agreed upon with Pennsylvania in 1767. The 
southern line of Pennsylvania is Mason and Dixon’s line. 


representative body much like the house of burgesses in Vir¬ 
ginia was established. There were a good many quarrels 
between the people, on the one hand, and the governor, who 

1 It is well to remember that almost everywhere in Europe there w r as 
bitter feeling on religious matters; from 1618 to 1648 was fought the 
Thirty Years’ War, in part a result of bitter religious hatred, one of the 
most awful wars that has ever cursed humanity. We should notice 
that it was during these thirty years that Maryland was founded and, 
as we have seen, Rhode Island also. One dislikes to admit that in later 
years Maryland passed laws that were unfair to the Catholics; but 
these early years of good feeling and good sense were not all wasted. 













SOUTHERN COLONIES 


93 



was the representative of the proprietor, on the other. 1 But 
gradually, as the years went by,the people, by their assembly, 
gained more and more power; the proprietor and the gov¬ 
ernor, whom he appointed, had to do in most respects as the 
people wished. 

147. Tobacco and the Plantation.—At an early day 
Maryland, like Virginia, gave itself up to tobacco raising. 
Some corn and 
wheat were 
raised, and oc¬ 
casionally other 
things, but the 
great product 
was tobacco. 

All the efforts of 
the proprietor of 
Maryland and of 
the men that 
governed Vir¬ 
ginia to compel 
the building of Loading Tobacco at the Planter’s own 
towns where Wharf 

there would be shops, taverns, warehouses, and wharves 
failed. The population was scattered along the great water¬ 
ways, and the plantation, with its wide fields and its pleasant 
gardens, fronted generally on some river or bay. Sea-going 
ships sailed up to the planter’s wharf, brought him goods 
from England, took on a cargo of tobacco, and sailed away 
again. It was easy to roll down the hogsheads of tobacco to 
the wharf and exchange them for the tables, brooms, or 
wooden bowls made in England, made perhaps out of wood 
cut in the forests of the colony. Even when the plantations 
were not on any of the deep rivers or bays the planter could 


1 There was also a serious quarrel with a Virginian, William Clai¬ 
borne, who had a fur-trading post in Baltimore’s territory and who 
gave it up only after making a great deal of trouble. 





















94 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


bring his crop to the vessels down the little streams in light 
boats, and in this way could easily exchange his crop for the 
English goods he wanted. 1 New England farmers, earning a 
hard living on their rugged soil, had no such great crop 

to send abroad, and 
they might spin, weave, 
whittle, and saw; but in 
the colonies of the South 
men were so busy rais¬ 
ing tobacco that they 
had no time for arts and 
crafts. 

148. Virginia and 
Maryland Have Coun¬ 
ties.—At a very early 
time, in addition to the general government of the whole 
colony, counties were established in both Virginia and 
Maryland. 2 These counties were much like the shires or 
counties of England, and the officers of the counties were 
much like those of the English counties. The chief officers 

1 The pupil by a glance at the map on p. 92 will see that Virginia 
and Maryland are indented with bays and threaded by great rivers 
and little streams. These waterways and the rich soil, good for 
tobacco raising, account for the absence of cities and towns in colonial 
times. In later days, when Thomas Jefferson in Revolutionary times 
went to the capital of the colony, Williamsburg, he had never before 
seen more than a dozen houses together. Patrick Henry had had the 
same experience. 

2 The earliest divisions in Maryland were manors. These were like 
the old manors of England—a relic of ages gone by—for there was an 
idea that in this new country the early institutions of England could be 
reproduced. It is certainly interesting to think that, as the counties 
of America were made in imitation of the old English shires, so there 
existed for a time in Maryland these old manors and hundreds that 
take us back many centuries into the very dawn of English history. 
Such a fact makes us realize that all our institutions of government 
and our political habits were not made in a day. We owe these to 
the past. 



A Southern Planter’s Home 





SOUTHERN COLONIES 


95 


were the county lieutenant, a sheriff, and justices. All of these 
were appointed by the governor, and were the agents, not 
of the people of the county, but of the general government 
of the colony. Thus, in the South, management of local 
affairs was in the hands of a few people, generally the big 
plantation owners, and they cherished this power and were 
proud of it; they were, as a general thing, able men and well 
fitted for their duties. But we should notice that the situa¬ 
tion was quite different from that in the colonies established 
at the North, in some of which the people elected all the 
officers, from the governor down. 

149. The Beginnings of North Carolina.—The land south 
of Virginia was not peopled for fifty years and more after the 
settlement at Jamestown. A few people wandered away 
from the older settlement in to the great forest region to the 
South; some people from the English island, Barbadoes, set¬ 
tled at the mouth of the Cape Fear River. Such were the 
beginnings of North Carolina; but they did not offer much 
encouragement for the speedy settlement and upbuilding of 
this great and fertile region. 

150. The Beginnings of South Carolina.—In 1663 
Charles II granted to some of his favorites—dukes and earls 
and knights—a vast tract of land south of Virginia, over 
which the proprietors were given power like that given to 
Lord Baltimore. They soon set about colonizing their 
land, especially the southern portions of it. In 1670 two 
shiploads of immigrants settled on the west shore of the 
Ashley River. This was the beginning of South Carolina. Ten 
years later the chief settlement was moved to the present site 
of Charleston. Almost from the beginning the colony was 
prosperous and vigorous. 

151. Many Nations Come to the Carolinas.—The settlers 
in Virginia and Maryland were mostly Englishman; but to 
the Carolinas came people from different nations. French 
Protestants, called Huguenots—fleeing from persecutions, 
stealing away by night lest they be hanged for trying to 


96 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


go—left France and came to this new, attractive country 
in hopes of finding peace and of making a living. Some of 
South Carolina’s most famous men of later years were chil¬ 
dren or grandchildren of these fugitive Huguenots. 1 Sturdy 
Hollanders and hardy Scotch-Irish also came. After a time 
there came, too, the most interesting of all, the plaided and 
bare-kneed Scotch Highlanders, bold fellows who had re¬ 
sisted the power of the English king, and now came to Amer¬ 
ica to find new homes in the wilderness. Liberty-loving 
Swiss and industrious Germans settled along the sea coast; 
and the eighteenth century had not far advanced when Ger¬ 
mans and Scotch-Irish from Virginia and the North found 
their way into the back country of the Carolinas by way of 
the valleys of the Appalachian Mountains. The settlement 
of the Carolinas is an interesting illustration of the saying that 
the settlement of the new world is the story of the persecu¬ 
tions of the old world. 

152. The “Grand Model.”—Probably people would not 
have come in such numbers to settle the Carolinas if the 
proprietors had been successful in carrying out their plans. 
They tried hard to set up a system of government in the col¬ 
onies that was very ill suited to the people’s needs. They 
drew up a scheme, a sort of plan of government, known as the 
“Grand Model,” 2 which provided for the division of the land 
into great estates. They would divide the people up into 
grades and classes; some were to be great landowners, to be 
“ landgraves ” or “ caciques,” and others were to be “ leet men,” 
or common people, forevermore. The proprietors might as 
well have saved their time and paper, for to America, the 

1 Henry Laurens and General Marion, for example, of whom we may 
read in the story of the Revolution. It has been said with some reason 
that, in proportion to their number, the Huguenots have produced more 
distinguished men than any other class of people coming to America. 

2 Also called the “ Fundamental Constitutions,” and sometimes 
mockingly spoken of as the “Grand Muddle.” John Locke, a great 
English philosopher, seems to have prepared this scheme, but perhaps 
only under the direction of the proprietors or some of them. 



SOUTHERN COLONIES 


97 


land of opportunity, men came to better their condition and 
not to settle down to be “ leet men for all generations.’’ 1 The 
colonists soon made it plain that they would not be bothered 
by this absurd plan, and, though the proprietors with surpris¬ 
ing obstinacy insisted on it, it was never really enforced. 

The people finally got the right not only to buy land for 
themselves but to make their own laws. The experiment 
with the “ Grand Model” was a fine example of the way in 
which American surroundings forced men to get along with¬ 
out the fine distinctions that separated the people of Europe 
into classes. Here men demanded a share in the govern¬ 
ment. 

153. The Carolinas Royal Colonies, 1720, 1729.—The 

Carolinas, on the whole, prospered, especially South Caro¬ 
lina. Early in the eighteenth century the people could no 
longer stand the rule of the proprietors and of the governors 
who were sent from England. South Carolina rebelled 
(1719) and in the following year became a royal colony, or 
one whose governor was appointed by the king. As for North 
Carolina, the people there were in one uprising after another, 
and in 1729 they, too, were relieved of proprietary rule and 
came directly under the Crown, having a governor chosen by 
the king. 

154. North Carolina Not So Prosperous as Virginia.—The 

two colonies were very different from each other. North 
Carolina had vast pine forests from which the settlers made 
pitch, tar, and turpentine. They cut timber and made 
lumber, they had farms and raised tobacco; but there were 
few of the fine large plantations with stately mansion houses, 
such as were found along the wide, beautiful rivers of Vir- 


1 For men sitting quietly in their libraries in old England, three 
thousand miles away from the palmetto groves of the Carolinas, to 
make a cast-iron social system and try to force it on the free people 
of a new wild country was the height of folly. If we learn anything 
from history it is that governments and habits of life grow slowly, 
and great ends are gained only by much toil and long effort. 



98 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


ginia. Much of the land was not very fertile, the settlers as 
a rule were poor, and while they raised good tobacco on their 
scattered plantations, there was neither the comfort nor the 
elegance that came, as the years went by, to the people of 
Virginia. 

155. South Carolina Prospers Greatly.—South Carolina, 
on the other hand, had rich soil, and, above all, a fine seaport. 
Along the coast were great stretches of swampy land, and 
before the settlements were very old, the planters had learned 
to make use of them. A captain of a vessel brought from far¬ 
away Madagascar a bag of rice. It was planted and throve 
amazingly. From the few pounds came thousands and at 
last millions of pounds, until rice became one of South Caro¬ 
lina’s chief products, as it is to-day. Indigo, too, began to 
be raised in large quantities. For tilling the rice swamps 
negro slaves were brought from the West Indies or fresh from 

Africa, and, as it was 
thought that white men 
could not endure the 
hot, tiresome toil, slaves 
were imported in ever 
greater numbers. Be¬ 
fore long there were more 
negroes than white peo¬ 
ple in South Carolina. 

156. How the Planter 
Enjoyed Life in Charles¬ 
ton. — Charleston was 
the center of the life of 
the colony, and it became a beautiful, prosperous town, 
with fine streets and large, hospitable homes, where the 
owners of the big plantations lived with some display and 
with considerable jollity. During the summer months the 
planters gathered from all the country round in this bright 
little town by the sea to avoid the heat and mosquitoes of 
the rice swamps and the inland plantations. Many lived 



A Charleston Home of Colonial 
Times 







SOUTHERN COLONIES 


99 


in the town the whole year and enjoyed themselves with 
balls and horse races and various sports, while their over¬ 
seers managed their plantations and kept their hundreds o: 
slaves at work. Vessels from England came into the har¬ 
bor and brought English goods, and the people knew little 
of the settlements that were founded in the North, be¬ 
cause between them and the northern colonies lay the 
extended forests of North Carolina, almost pathless, while 
the route by sea was dangerous and uninviting because of 
the fierce storms that raged off Hatteras. 

157. Need of a “ Buffer ” Colony.—Long after the Caro- 
linas had become thriving colonies, the Spaniards, who kept 
a hold upon Florida by means of the fort and settlement at 
St. Augustine, continued to watch jealously the progress 
of English settlement southward. A new colony south of 
the settled regions of the Carolinas would be helpful to the 
English as a sort of military outpost against the Spaniards, 
and this was one of the reasons for founding Georgia, but 
there was a nobler motive. 

158. Oglethorpe Plans to Help Poor Debtors.—It tvas the 
idea of General James Oglethorpe, a brave, generous, and hu¬ 
mane soldier, to found there a refuge for debtors. He had 
been sent by Parliament to examine the English prisons, and 
had found them in a most wretched state. By the English 
law of that time a man who could not pay his debts, whether 
because of dishonesty, shiftlessness, or sickness, was thrown 
into prison. There he stayed, whether ill or well, until some 
one paid his debts, for he had no way of earning money, and 
the fees which the jailer was allowed to ask grew into a new 
debt. 1 Jails were pitiful places in that day, where food and 
care were both wretched, and much cruelty was permitted. 
Surely, the kind-hearted statesman thought, if he could pay 
the debts of these poor fellows, set them free, and get them 
and their families to America, where honest toil was always 

1 The jails were well filled in Oglethorpe’s time, for a great fraud, 
fhe ‘‘South Sea Bubble,” had ruined many honest people. 




100 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


rewarded, they would be glad to take the risks on the Eng¬ 
lish frontier. 

159. Georgia Founded, 1733.—A charter was secured from 
King George II (1732) which made Oglethorpe and twenty- 
one others trustees to hold the land “for the poor.” The 
colony was called Georgia in honor of the king. So much 

money was given by 
Parliament and private 
persons to furnish col¬ 
onists with passage and 
tools that plenty of men 
offered to go out with 
Oglethorpe when he set 
sail in 1732. The colo¬ 
nists settled on the Sav¬ 
annah River (1733) and 
named the new town 
Savannah. 1 So success¬ 
ful was this military 
outpost that before 
Oglethorpe finally left his colony, the Spaniards of Florida 
had been so beaten that they let the Southern colonies 
alone. 

Charitable as the founders of Georgia were, they made 
some rules which caused discontent among the settlers. It 
was a provision of the charter that the trustees should make 
all the laws, but this left the people as helpless as children, 
and denied them that fine political education which self- 


1 The more shiftless of the debtors did not do very well, but soon 
there came some Austrians from the beautiful Tyrolese town of Salz¬ 
burg, and these thrifty people did much for the success of the colony. 
The settlement was strengthened as a military outpost by a company 
of Scotch Highlanders, sturdy fighters, who were a great help when 
Spain tried to destroy the new settlement. When Oglethorpe came to 
them they received him “in martial style, with broad swords, targets, 
and firearms.” 



The Carolinas and Georgia 











ENGLAND AND HER COLONIES 


101 


government gives. The trustees also forbade negro slavery. 
But the Georgia settlers soon found that without laborers 
they could not raise the Southern products as cheaply as the 
Carolinians; and the easiest way to get laborers was to bring 
in slaves. John and Charles Wesley 1 who came to Geor¬ 
gia to preach to the Indians, agreed with the trustees, but 
George Whitefield, the famous preacher who partly sup¬ 
ported an orphan asylum by the proceeds of slave labor, 
earnestly argued for the wishes of the colonists. At last 
the buying of slaves (1750) was permitted. When finally 
the land laws were changed so that larger tracts of land 
might be acquired, content was restored. In 1752 Georgia 
became a royal province. 


Suggested Readings 

Histories: Alderman, A Brief History of North Carolina . Mc- 
Carkle, Old Time Stories of the Old North State. Harris, Stories of 
Georgia. Chappelle, Georgia History Stories. Means, Palmetto 
Stories (S. C.). Massey and Wood, The Story of Georgia. Passano, 
Maryland. Fiske, Old Virginia and Her Neighbors, I, 255-274; II, 
276-297, 308-324, 333-336. Cooper, James Oglethorpe. 

Sources: Hart, American History Told by Contemporaries, I, 252- 
257, 261-271, 110-114. Hart, Source Readers, No. I, 23-48. 


CHAPTER XIV 

THE RELATIONS BETWEEN ENGLAND AND HER 

COLONIES 

160. The Colonies Affected by English Conditions.—While 
England was planting her colonies from Maine to Georgia 
along the Atlantic coast, events were happening in the 
home land which were to have great influence upon the 
future of America. The colonies were, after all, a part of the 

1 John Wesley, later, in England, was the founder of the Methodist 
Church. 




102 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


British Empire, and therefore were deeply affected by changes 
in English politics. 1 

161. King Charles and Parliament Quarrel.—Many Puri¬ 
tans, it will be recalled, left England because they despaired 
of getting King Charles to respect their rights. As long as he 
could get on without Parliament, as he was doing at the 
time so many Puritans fled to America, there was no control¬ 
ling him; but at last (1640) he had to 
call the people’s representatives to¬ 
gether, because he needed money and 
hoped they would vote it to him. 
Then Parliament took matters in its 
own hands, and there came an open 
rupture between king and Parliament. 
Thereupon, the people of England took 
sides, some upholding the king and 
some opposing him. Those English¬ 
men who were faithful to the king 
w r ere called Royalists or Cavaliers, 2 
and they began war upon Parliamen¬ 
tarians or Roundheads, 3 as the Parlia¬ 
ment followers were called. With an army of “ honest, 
godly men,” wonderfully disciplined by the great Puritan 
leader, Oliver Cromwell, the Parliament party after a long 
struggle destroyed the king’s army at Naseby (1645). 

162. Cromwell and the Commonwealth.—A faction of the 
Roundhead party which was independent 4 in religion now 



Oliver Cromwell 


1 Those events of English history which are most important for our 
study have been told up to the time when the Puritans came to Massa¬ 
chusetts Bay, and with that time we resume them. 

2 Because as a rule they were nobles, gentry, and landowners. 

3 Because as Puritans they cut their hair close, and did not wear it 
in long curls, as the more stylish people did. The Roundheads were 
people of the towns, manufacturers, merchants, and artisans. 

4 That is, they were not Episcopalians, nor even moderate Puritans 
who wished to stay in the Episcopal Church and “purify” it, but were 
separatists like the Pilgrims of the Plymouth colony. 




ENGLAND AND HER COLONIES 103 

took control of the government. This party tried the king 
for treason and beheaded him (1649). After a failure to set 
up a really democratic republic, such as some of their party 
had already established in Rhode Island and Connecticut, 
the question as to how England should be ruled was decided 
by making Cromwell “Lord Protector” of the Common¬ 
wealth. This did away with royal government, but did not 
secure a truly democratic one where the people really 
ruled. 

163. Virginia Faithful to the King.—While these great 
changes were going on in England, it was not possible that 
her colonies should be unaffected. Virginia, where there 
were many large land owners, and whither 
many Cavaliers, or king’s friends, fled,was, 
on the whole, friendly to the king. Its 
assembly passed a resolution, when they 
heard of his death, in which they lamented 
the loss of “the most excellent and now 
undoubtedly sainted king.” They even 
refused at first to obey Parliament. But 
when Cromwell was able to turn from his 
many other tasks and to send a fleet to 
Virginia, the rebellious colonists surren¬ 
dered without a blow. Though most of the 
Royalists of high rank preferred going to 
France to escape from Cromwell’s power, 
yet a stead}^ stream of Englishmen, most 
of them Cavaliers of the lower rank, now 
flowed into Virginia. 

164. New England Practices Self-Government.—In Puri¬ 
tan New England the effect of the struggle in the mother 
county was very different. Immigration almost ceased with 
the beginning of the war between the king and Parliament. 
Puritans were needed at home, and none but Puritans had 
any inducement to come to New England. But there were 
other results of great moment. From the opening of the 



A Typical 
Cavalier 


104 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


struggle until the end of Cromwell’s rule (1642-60), New 
England governed itself and thus got into the habit of inde¬ 
pendence. Cromwell’s time, therefore, was a period in which 
New England made great progress in its advance toward 
political liberty. 

165. Cromwell, a Great Ruler.—Taking up English politi¬ 
cal history again, we find that Cromwell did much to make 
the English nation the greatest commercial power in the 
world, for he was a man of great ability, of tireless indus¬ 
try, and of great courage. Cromwell, by his dealings with 
foreign nation^nd by increasing British naval strength, laid 
the foundation of England’s great colonial empire, 1 wherein 
the American colonies had so important a position. But 
Cromwell’s powers depended altogether on his own great¬ 
ness as a man. At his death his son succeeded to the 
exalted place, but, being a weaker man, he was soon 
overthrown, and Charles II, son of Charles I, was called 
to the throne of England (1660). This was called 11 the 
Restoration.” 

166. Charles II (1660-85); James II (1685-88); The Revo¬ 
lution of 1688.—Charles II was wise enough not to go 
far in opposing the people’s wishes. He used to say that he 
did not care to go on his travels again. But his brother, 
James II, who at Charles’ death succeeded to the throne 
(1685), was intolerant and obstinate. The people came to 
dislike him thoroughly, for they distrusted him. As a 
result, King James was finally driven from his kingdom, 
and William of Orange, who had married James’ daughter 
Mary, was called by Parliament to reign with her over Eng¬ 
land. This fixed the right of the people’s representatives 
to decide the question of who should be king. At this time 
King William’s approval was secured to a “ Bill of Rights ”— 
a written statement of the rights of the people and of Parlia¬ 
ment. With this “ Revolution of 1688 ” began a new era 


1 Which to-day is the greatest possessed by any country in the world. 



ENGLAND AND HER COLONIES 105 

in English political history—an era in which Parliament 
held the real control of the government. 

167. Connecticut and Rhode Island Get Charters.— 

These English events had some important effects in America 
aside from the general increase of English liberty. Charles 
II had hardly regained his throne (1660) before he turned his 
attention to the colonies. He could 
not forget that two of the judges 
who condemned his father to death 
had fled to New Haven, and there 
they were sheltered and saved from 
pursuing royal officers. This colony, 
therefore, the king annexed against 
its will to Connecticut, but at the 
same time, curiously enough, he gave 
Connecticut and Rhode Island most 
liberal charters, long dearly valued 
by these colonies. 

168. Massachusetts Loses Her 
Charter.—For nearly twenty years, 
on the other hand, there was danger that Massachusetts 
would lose her charter, and finally such was the result. Near 
the end of Charles’ reign (1684), the charter of the great 
Puritan commonwealth was taken away, and it no longer 
enjoyed the measure of self-government of former times. 
New Hampshire, which had been under the control of Mas¬ 
sachusetts, was made a royal province, the first in New 
England. 

169. Charles Forgets the Loyal Virginians.—This disre¬ 
gard of colonial rights by Charles II extended to loyal Vir¬ 
ginia as well as to Puritanical Massachusetts. In 1673 he 
granted all Virginia to two of his disreputable court favor¬ 
ites, Arlington and Culpepper, and the Virginians had to buy 
them off as best they could. In these same years the Virgin¬ 
ian legislature was in the control of men who were corrupt 
and self-seeking, while the royal governor, Berkeley, who had 



106 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


ruled many years, was harsh in his treatment of the colonists 
if they did not do as he wished. The owners of big plan¬ 
tations got all the power, and the poorer people had little to 
say in the government. 

170 Bacon’s Rebellion, 1676.—When matters were at 
their worst in Virginia the Indians arose, and Berkeley did 
nothing to protect the people. 1 Thereupon, young Nathan¬ 
iel Bacon, at the head of a band of frontiersmen, the poorer 
farmers back from the seaboard, defeated the Indians, 
much to the disgust of Governor Berkeley, who was a born 
aristocrat, and who thought the common people ought to fol¬ 
low, not lead, even in fighting Indians. Berkeley regarded 
Bacon as a rebel, and his followers were called “ the scum of 
the country.” The long struggle which now ensued between 
Bacon’s followers and the governor’s forces was a revolt of 
the poor farmers on the frontier against the power of the rich 
planters nearer the coast. When, after Bacon’s death, the 
revolt failed, Berkeley punished the surviving rebels so se¬ 
verely that Charles II declared : “ The old fool has hanged 
more men in that naked country than I did here for the mur¬ 
der of my father.” The failure of the rebellion marks the 
triumph of the planters, of Virginia’s aristocracy, in govern¬ 
ment and society. 

171. England Plans to Unite the Colonies.—By the time 

of the reign of James II (1685-88) the desire of the English 
government to rule the colonies more strictly had become 
a ve^ real danger to their liberty. It was hard for the 
men in the king’s council in England to look after so many 
colonies, and especially hard to make the colonies obey 
the Navigation Acts, the laws about trading with foreign 
nations. The English authorities, therefore, proposed that 
the Northern colonies at least be united; and in the 

1 It was said that because the governor’s income depended upon the 
duties received for the exported furs, he cared more for the welfare of 
the fur-trading Indians than for his colonists. “No bullets can pierce 
beaver skins,” the angry Virginians used to say. 



ENGLAND AND HER COLONIES 107 

reign of James II a governor-general of all New England 
was appointed. 

172. Andros, Governor-General. —The new governor-gen¬ 
eral was Sir Edmund Andros, a soldier, bluff, coarse, and hot- 
tempered. Acting under royal instructions, he took all politi¬ 
cal power from the people. So great was his influence over the 
council which was appointed to aid him, and the judges whom 
he appointed, that in fact he alone made laws, applied them 
in the courts, and executed them. Thus there was in New 
England no check upon his absolute power. All the dearly 
won English practices of 
freedom and self-govern¬ 
ment were set aside. 

173. The Dominion of 
New England. — Gradu¬ 
ally Andros extended his 
royal master’s tyranny 
from New England to 
New York and New Jer¬ 
sey, and the deadly des¬ 
potism was creeping on 
southward, when there 
came to America the 
news of the overthrow 
of James II and the 
so-called “ Glorious Rev¬ 
olution” (1688) which 
set William and Mary 
on the throne. At once the New England militia poured 
into Boston, seized Andros and his agents and threw them 
into prison. Thus ended the attempt to wipe out colonial 
self-government. 

174. Massachusetts Gets a New Charter, 1691, —Later, in 
1691, a new charter called the Province Charter was given to 
Massachusetts. This did not leave the people as independ¬ 
ent as Connecticut, but left them less under royal control 











108 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


than the people of Virginia. Their governor was appointed 
by the king, but his council was elected by the repre¬ 
sentatives of the people and approved by the governor. 
Plymouth was made a part of Massachusetts, whose control 
over Maine was also recognized. 

175. The Revolution in New York.—In New York the news 
of the revolution was joyfully received, and Andros’ agent 
there was driven out. The revolt (1689) was led by Jacob 
Leisler, an able and energetic German merchant, who was 
rash and careless as to the way of getting reforms but honest 
in his desire to destroy the old tyranny. He enjoyed the 
power which now fell into his hands, and when King William 
sent a new governor, Leisler put off the surrender of his 
power until compelled by force. He was thereupon tried 
and sentenced to hang as a traitor. The governor, under the 
influence of drink, it is said, signed the order for his execu¬ 
tion. With this terrible inj ustice ended the life of one of the 
best American friends of England’s “ Glorious Revolution.” 

176. The Navigation Acts, 1651, 1672, etc.—During these 
years (1651, 1672, etc.) England passed a number of laws 
whose purpose was to increase British customs revenues 
and benefit her merchants. Colonial trade could by these 
laws be carried on only in English or colonial ships. The 
products of the colonies must be brought to England before 
being carried to other countries, and goods from other coun¬ 
tries must pass through English ports before being taken to 
the colonies. Thus England was made a great bargain 
counter for trade between Europe and the American 
colonies. 

177. The Laws Not Always Enforced.—These regulations 

sometimes hampered and annoyed the colonies, and there 
was more or less smuggling; it was easy to enter some small 
bay or river where were no king’s officers, and there unload 
goods, which then might be hauled to the nearest town. A 
law passed in 1733, which was intended to compel the colo¬ 
nists to deal with the planters of the English West Indies 


ENGLAND AND HER COLONIES 109 

rather than those of the French islands, was much the 
hardest to enforce and was, in fact, nearly a dead letter. 1 

178. The Colonists Struggle for Rights.—All through the 
colonial time the colonists struggled for certain political privi¬ 
leges which they had learned to value, and for the rights 
promised them in their charters. This struggle is most 
clearly seen in the relations between the royal governors 
and the colonial legislatures. Colonial governors, appointed 
by the king or the proprietors, 2 were almost always quarreling 
with the legislatures, which were elected by the people, and 
better understood their feelings and wishes. The bad feeling 
between governor and legislature was made worse because 
the king often sent as governors, needy courtiers, who wanted 
as much money and as little trouble as possible. 

179. The Colonists Oppose the Governors.—The governors 
strove to have the legislatures make permanent grants of sal¬ 
aries, but the colonial lawmakers saw that it was better to 
grant the salary from year to year, and thus be able to with¬ 
hold it in case the governor refused to approve some colonial 
measure which was desired. Sometimes great privileges were 
gained in this way, and thus the royal power tended to grow 
weaker while the colonial power waxed strong. At times the 
colonial legislatures used their power rather foolishly, as in 
Pennsylvania, when Indians, urged by the French, were lay¬ 
ing waste the frontier, and the assembly refused to grant 
money to the governor to repel the attacks. The stubborn 
lawmakers said “ they had rather the French should conquer 
them than give up their privileges.” 


1 The Northern colonists took their fish and lumber to the French 
West Indies and brought back molasses and sugar. They made rum 
from the molasses and took it to Africa to exchange for slaves and 
brought the slaves to x\merica. This was a profitable business, but 
one fraught with unhappiness for America. People did not then look 
with disfavor on rum nor did they loathe slavery. 

2 Except in Connecticut and Rhode Island, where the people elected 
their own governors. 



110 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


180. The Important Facts To Be Remembered.—In the 

relations of the colonies to the mother country from the 
founding of Virginia to the middle of the eighteenth cen¬ 
tury there are certain facts important to notice. (1) The 
general conduct of the colonies was carefully watched by the 
English Government. (2) The governors sent by the king 
or the proprietors were given careful orders what to do or not 
to do, but they found the colonial legislatures stubborn and 
not afraid to resist. The governor might veto the legisla¬ 
ture’s acts, but it would then refuse him his salary, and his 
need often made it the master. (3) Almost the only limit 
to the colonial legislature’s power was the loyalty of the 
colonists to the king, whose personal right to rule they ac¬ 
knowledged. If he disallowed a colonial act, even after the 
governor had approved it, they submitted, though thejr often 
grumbled very ominously. Furthermore, (4) the colonists 
admitted the right of Parliament to make laws for all parts of 
the British Empire in matters of trade. Finally, (5) when 
England was at war, her enemies were looked upon as the 
colonies’ enemies. In the case of the one great enemy and 
rival, France, the colonial fear of its growing power in 
America was one of the strongest bonds which kept the colo¬ 
nies dependent upon England. They needed her protection. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: Cheyney, School History of England. Wrong, History of 
the British Nation. Roberts, New York, 178-214. Fisher, Colonial 
Era, 149-164. Coffin, Old Times in the Colonies, 265-270. Fiske, 
Beginnings of New England, 267-278. Elson, History of United 
States, 120-127. 

Sources: Hart, American History Told by Contemporaries, I, 
542-547. 


STRUGGLE FOR NORTH AMERICA 


111 


CHAPTER XV 

FRANCE AND ENGLAND STRUGGLE FOR NORTH 

AMERICA 

181. The English Between the Mountains and the 
Coast.—In spite of the fact that English colonists had settled 
all along the Atlantic coast of North America, it was not at all 
sure at the beginning of the eighteenth century that Eng¬ 
lish-speaking peoples would control the land which is now 
the United States. In what is now Florida and Texas, the 
Spanish had a foothold, 
while France, for reasons 
which will be shown, had 
extended its power through 
all of Canada, the Great 
Lake region, and the Mis¬ 
sissippi basin. In the next 
place, there was a great 
physical barrier which 
prevented a movement 
westward. Back of these 
English colonies from New 
Hampshire to Georgia lay 
the Appalachian system of 
mountains, not a single 

. . Showing the mountain ranges that pre- 

high range, but a scries of vented movement westward. 

ranges, fold after fold 

covered with dense forests, extending like a wall many miles 
deep. If men would cross it, they must make a long, hard 
journey, passing through one gap in the first range, only to 
find another wall along which they must travel to another 
gap. Before they could get out on the other side, they 
must travel many weary miles of narrow mountain paths, 
often compelled to cut their way through the forest. 




112 • THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 

182. The French and Indians Block the Westward Move¬ 
ment.—For the English colonist there was one great gateway 
in this wall. He could go up the Hudson to Albany, and 
thence up the Mohawk River and over a low ridge to 

Lake Erie; but if the 
Iroquois suffered him to 
go that way, the French 
and their Indian allies 
strongly objected. 1 Other 
Indian tribes at the south 
end of the Appalachian 
system prevented men 
from going safely around 
the mount ains which there 
break down into low hills. 
Thus the English colon¬ 
ists were hemmed in along 
the seacoast, while, as the 
story of the explorations 
of Marquette and La 
Salle showed us, the 
French, going behind that 
wall by way of the St. Lawrence River, had traveled far and 
wide over much of the country drained by the Mississippi 
River and the great streams flowing into it. 

183. Strength of the English Settlements.—But there was 
another effect of the great mountain wall, more important, 
but not so easily seen. Since the English were in the early 
days barred from the fur trade of the vast Mississippi basin, 
they took more to commerce and farming and trades, 
which led them to found villages and cities. They built 
schoolhouses and churches, and made their way back from 
the sea slowly as population increased and more land was 



Relief Map of the Southern 
Colonies 


Showing the low, fertile coastal plains 
and the ranges that blocked westward 
movement. 


1 The French held the friendship of the Algonquins, who were deadly 
enemies of the Iroquois. 




STRUGGLE FOR NORTH AMERICA 


113 


needed. 1 Where they did go, they settled, plowing up the 
hunting grounds of the Indians and driving them farther 
away instead of making friends of the red men as the French 
did in the Great Lake Region and in the great basin beyond 
the Alleghenies. 

184. The French Are Scattered.—The Frenchmen trading 
with the Indians were lured on into the continent by the 
far-stretching waterways. Paddling their bark canoes, they 
penetrated the farthest reaches of the Great Lake Region 
and went even beyond along the upper waters of the Mis¬ 
sissippi Valley. Here and there they built a log fort to 
guard the country and to keep the fur trade for themselves, 
but they built few towns. Ever, with remarkable courage, 
pushing on into new regions, they claimed all this Western 
land for France. Their settlements were not closely knit 
together; their roads and highways were the streams and 
lakes of the great West. 

185. Lack of Self-Government Among French Colonies.— 

The little settlements in Canada and Louisiana were not much 
like the English colonies of the coast. The French people in 
the new world, as in Europe, had no part in governing them¬ 
selves; they had no chance to gain the strength that comes 
with self-reliance and practice in self-government. From 
France came orders and laws, and the men of New France lis¬ 
tened to the voice of distant authority rather than to their 
own good counsels. 

186. Relations Between England and France.—These, 
then, were the differences between the English and French 
settlements in America at a time when the two nations began 
to struggle in both Europe and America for the mastery. In 
Europe, the French and English were rivals, but not until 
near the end of the seventeenth century was there open war. 

1 Of course men like the early settlers of New England came for 
homes, and not to wander and trade; even if they had not been barred 
from the West, they probably would have built more compact settle¬ 
ments than did the French. 



114 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


When by the “ Glorious Revolution ” of 1688 James II was 
driven from England, William of Orange was called from Hol¬ 
land to be the English king. Then war broke out between 
France and England, for William was the avowed enemy of 
Louis XIV and was strongly opposed to the development of 
French power. Of course the war spread to America, where 
the subjects of the two kings were already rivals, especially 
in the matter of the fur trade, and where each nation looked 
with suspicion on the growth of the other. 

187. King William’s War, 1689-97.—The first of the 
series of struggles which at last decided who should own 
North America was known in the colonies as King William’s 
War (1689-97), since it was in his reign that the w T ar began. 
The people of New England and New' York alone suffered, as 
only along the western and northern borders of the colonies 
had the two nations yet come in contact. The French 1 with 
their Indian allies attacked Schenectady in New A^ork. In 
the night, through the storm and darkness, they crept 
stealthily past the guards, and within two hours nearly all the 
men, women, and children of the town were slain or hurried 
away as prisoners. Like destruction reached some New Eng¬ 
land towns. The New Englanders, on their part, seized 
Port Royal, a French stronghold in Acadia, but when the war 
was ended (1697) it was returned to France, and thus noth¬ 
ing was gained by this bloodshed. 

188. Queen Anne’s War, 1701-13.—Within a few years, 
in the reign of Queen Anne, the. war was on again. Again 
the New England frontier bled, and the pioneers quailed at 
the sound of the Indian war whoop. Again the New Eng¬ 
landers seized Port Royal, and this time England held it and 
all Acadia at the close of the war (1713). 2 In the treaty of 


1 The French Government sent the able soldier Count Frontenac to 
lead the French forces in America. 

2 The name Port Royal was now changed to Annapolis, and Acadia 
to Nova Scotia. 



STRUGGLE FOR NORTH AMERICA 115 

peace at Utrecht, England’s claims to Newfoundland were 
also acknowledged. 

189. King George’s War, 1744-48.—A period of peace 
now followed (1713-44), during which France built, on 
Cape Breton Island, the powerful fortress of Louisburg, so 
strong that it was said women could defend it. They had 
already built a chain of military posts from New Orleans to 
Montreal to keep the English out of the Mississippi Valley. 
When war broke out again and the commander of Louisburg 
burned a little New England fishing village as his first hostile 
act, the English colonists were so indignant that they set out 
to capture the impregnable fortress. A lawyer made the plan, 
and with “ a merchant for general, and farmers, fishermen, 
and mechanics for soldiers ” they actually succeeded in doing 
what few military men would have attempted. They be¬ 
sieged in such a strange, irregular way that “ panic seized 
upon us,” a Frenchman wrote. Again the colonists had 
fought and bled in vain, however, for England, to get a little 
land in Hindustan, gave Louisburg back to the French. 
Thus, to the chagrin of the New Englanders, closed what was 
known as King George’s War (1748). 

190. The French Plan to Hold the Mississippi Valley.— 
Before another struggle should come, the French set about 
connecting their settlements on the lower Mississippi with 
those of New France on the St. Lawrence. French explorers 
passed the watershed between Lake Erie and the Allegheny 
River (1749) and came down the Ohio, burying at the river 
mouths leaden plates whereon was inscribed the claim of 
France to the river and the lands drained by it. 1 They soon 
saw that leaden bullets were more important than leaden 
plates, and Duquesne, the Governor of Canada, began to 

1 France based her claims on the fact that she had discovered the 
Mississippi and explored its tributaries—she claimed the land drained 
by all the rivers flowing into it. “The French king might as well 
claim all the lands that drink French brandy,” said an indignant 
Englishman. 



116 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


build forts, one where the city of Erie now stands and two 
on the Allegheny. He hoped thus to stop the English trad¬ 
ers and settlers, who were beginning to cross the Appalachian 
range through the passes which Nature had cut from the Po¬ 
tomac River to the head of the Ohio River, where Pittsburg 
now stands. The point was long known as the “ Gateway of 
the West,” because through it the settlers of the West must 
pass as they journeyed from the Atlantic seaboard. 

191. The Virginians Push Westward.—It w r as in Virginia 
that this westward movement of the English had begun. The 
energetic governor, Alexander Spotswood (1710-22), had 
led an exploring expedition over the Blue Ridge into the 
Shenandoah Valley, which awoke an interest in the western 
region. Later, in the second quarter of the eighteenth cen¬ 
tury, Virginian pioneers set their eager faces toward the fer¬ 
tile fields in the smiling mountain valleys west of them. Be¬ 
hind them on the tide-water rivers 1 they left the planters 
“ dressing richly, living on large estates, riding in coaches, 
and attending the Church of England,” while the hardy set¬ 
tlers cleared new land, erected new houses and churches, and 
built a new Virginia at the very outposts of civilization. 
It was these men who later led in the great westward move¬ 
ment across the plains and mountains to the Pacific coast. 

Their early advance had aroused the interest of some 
wealthy Virginians (1749), who secured from the English 
Government a grant of half a million acres near the head of 
the Ohio River, wherein to plant a settlement and to trade 
in furs. From the Potomac to a point on the Monongahela 
they caused a trail sixty miles long to be blazed. 2 Virginia 
thus opened a way to the Ohio basin, to which her charter 
gave her a claim. 


1 Rivers flowing into the Atlantic, up which the ocean tide swept as 
far as the first falls. 

' Nemacolin’s Path, later Washington’s Road, then Braddock’s 
Road, and at last Cumberland Pike. 

































.-ZmiKSin 





• ■ 























STRUGGLE FOR NORTH AMERICA 


117 


192. Washington Carries a Message to the French.— 

Governor Dinwiddie, of Virginia, watched the French build¬ 
ing forts to secure the Allegheny River, and at last sent a pro¬ 
test by a messenger of whose future fame no one then even 
dreamed. George Washington, the messenger, was already 
worthy of the trust, because of the courage, honesty, and good 
sense which he had shown in his work as a surveyor. 1 He 
had met the dangers of the forest, and, moreover, held the 
position of adjutant general in the Virginia militia. It was 
known that he always did what was given him to do in the 
best way he knew how, and such a man was needed for a dan¬ 
gerous journey of nearly a thousand miles through a dense, 
unbroken forest. Through the wilderness buried in the win¬ 
ter’s snow, felling trees to bridge the creeks, and making a 
raft to cross the Allegheny River, Washington, with one com¬ 
panion, pushed straight on and delivered the governor’s mes¬ 
sage to the French commander near Niagara. 

193. The Beginning of the French and Indian War, 
1754-63.— The French would not heed the warning, but 
rather hastened to build Fort Duquesne, where Pittsburg 
now stands. Thereupon Dinwiddie sent Washington with a 
small force to drive them away. He found them so strong 
that he built a few miles to the southward a fort called Fort 
Necessity. Here the French attacked him and forced him 
to surrender (July 4, 1754), but allowed him to return to 
Virginia. The great struggle for the Mississippi Valley was 
begun. 

194. The Albany Congress ; Franklin’s Plan of Union.— 

The American governors, thinking anxiously about the war, 
and knowing how unprepared they were to meet it, discussed 
various ways of getting the colonies to act together. In 1754 
a congress of delegates from a number of the colonies met 
at Albany, N. Y., and there Benjamin Franklin presented 

1 He had been a big, strong, active boy, afraid of nothing, and loving 
out-of-door life. He had once planned to go to sea and become a sea 
captain. 




118 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


a plan of union. It was submitted by the congress to the 
colonial governments and also to the king’s council in Eng¬ 
land, but it was adopted by neither colonies nor council. 
It is chiefly noteworthy because it was the real beginning of 
an effort to unite the colonies. At this congress the English 
colonies renewed their pledges of friendship with the Iro¬ 
quois, who, since the days of Champlain, had been ene¬ 
mies of the French. This greatly strengthened the colo¬ 
nies for the coming struggle. Sir William Johnson, whom 
the Iroquois had adopted, was very influential in gaining 
their aid. 

195. Braddock’s Defeat, 1755.— The English Government 
sent General Braddock to America with a small army of 

red-coated British regu¬ 
lars. Though both com¬ 
mander and troops might 
have made a good figure 
in some European war, 
they were quite unfit, as 
we shall see, for fighting 
Indians in the woods. 
Braddock gave little 
heed to the good ad¬ 
vice of Washington, who 
marched with him, lead¬ 
ing three companies of 
Virginians; but when the 
French and Indians am¬ 
bushed the little army 
not far from Fort Du- 
quesne, it was the wary 
Virginians that saved the 
army from complete destruction (1755). Braddock was 
fatally wounded, and died lamenting that he had refused 
to let his red-coated soldiers break ranks and fight from 
behind trees in the Indian fashion. Washington led the 



Showing the field of the western 
campaigns. 














STRUGGLE FOR NORTH AMERICA 119 

survivors safely back to Virginia, and the great valley was 
left for a time in French possession. 

196. War Between England and France.—The English 
wars with the French which we have studied hitherto were 
European wars that spread to America. The war which 
George Washington opened at Fort Necessity was an Amer¬ 
ican war which 
spread to Eu¬ 
rope. France 
and England 
were soon hotly 
engaged. At 
first the French 
were victorious 
in America. The 
English Govern¬ 
ment sent weak, 
inefficient gen¬ 
erals, and met 
defeat. In 1757, 
however, there came a change. William Pitt entered the 
British Cabinet and took charge of the war. One of the 
greatest statesmen that the world has ever seen now directed 
England’s plans. 1 

197. English Defeat is Followed by Victory.—Hope now 
took the place of despondency; most of the weak generals 
were recalled and able commanders were sent in their places. 
Victories followed at once. In 1758, Amherst and Wolfe 
took Louisburg, on Cape Breton Island. Forbes, with Wash¬ 
ington, captured Fort Duquesne, and the name was changed 
to Fort Pitt 2 in honor of the great war minister. On Lake 
Ontario, Fort Frontenac was captured, and when Sir William 

1 “England has at last produced a man,” said Frederick the Great. 
Pitt was full of confidence. “I am sure that I can save this country 
and that nobody else can,” he declared. 

2 Later became Pittsburg. 



Showing the field of the northern and eastern 
campaigns. 










120 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


Johnson captured Niagara and rebuilt Fort Oswego, the 
French communications with the Mississippi by way of the 
Ohio were broken. The English failed at first to take 
Ticonderoga, but in the following year Amherst kook it and 
Crown Point, and the way to Canada by Lake Champlain 
was laid open. Except by the way of the St. Lawrence 
Valley, this Champlain route was the only way of approach 



The Fortress of Quebec from the River 

From a recent photograph. This picture shows the apparent inaccessi¬ 
bility of the heights which Wolfe stormed. 

to Canada, which was shielded from New England at all 
other points by thick and almost impassable forests. 

198. General Wolfe Takes Quebec.—One great task re¬ 
mained if French power was to be destroyed in America. 
Quebec, the strongest American fortress, was the key to the 
whole St. Lawrence Valley, and it was commanded by the 
noble Montcalm, one of the ablest of the French generals. 
General Wolfe, a skillful and daring young English com¬ 
mander, was chosen for the task of capturing it. The fortress 
of Quebec stood at the top of a very high hill. To climb the 
heights in the face of the enemy was thought impossible. Af¬ 
ter three months of fruitless effort to entice the French to an 
open fight, Wolfe conceived the plan of scaling the high bluffs 
by way of a ravine which gave a footing. By this plan the 
















STRUGGLE FOR NORTH AMERICA 


121 


English hoped to reach the level highland behind the fort, 
called the Plains of Abraham. At night, with three thousand 
five hundred men, Wolfe succeeded, and Montcalm, sur¬ 
prised, was obliged to give battle. Both Wolfe and Mont¬ 
calm were killed, the French were beaten, and Quebec fell 
(September, 1759) into the hands of the English. 1 Mon¬ 
treal was captured in the following year by General Amherst. 

199. The End of the War; Results.— The fall of Quebec 
was one of the greatest events in history, for with it fell 
French power in America. The struggle soon ended on this 
side of the Atlantic, and when the war ended in Europe (by 
the Treaty of Paris, 1763), Canada and the land claimed by 
the French east of the Mississippi River were given up by 
France to England. At the same time New Orleans and 
all French claims west of the Mississippi, known as Louis¬ 
iana, were ceded to Spain, because she had aided France 
in the war and had thereby lost Florida to the English. 
England now became the greatest colonial power in the 
world. “ This,” said a great Englishman, “ has been the 
most glorious war and the most triumphant peace that 
England ever knew.” It was indeed a most important vic¬ 
tory, because England became possessed of the eastern part 
of the great Mississippi valley, and her coast colonies were 
made safe. 

200. The Conspiracy of Pontiac.—Though the war with the 
French was finished, many of the Indians were discontented 
and cherished resentment against England. Pontiac, an 
able Ottawa chief, plotted to take revenge upon the English, 

1 “England blazed with bonfires,” Parkman says. “In one spot 
alone all was dark and silent, for here a widowed mother mourned for a 
loving and devoted son, and the people forebore to profane her grief 
with the clamor of their rejoicings.” 

There is an interesting story told of Wolfe in the hard hours of sus¬ 
pense before the actual climb to the Plains of Abraham began. He 
repeated to those about him the verses of Gray’s beautiful poem “ Elegy 
Written in a Country Churchyard.” “Gentlemen,” he said, “I would 
rather have written those words than take Quebec to-morrow.” 



122 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


and raised up the western tribes against them. In 1763 he 
attacked Detroit, and continued to besiege the place for 
months. The English forces at length overcame him; but, 
as we shall see, for thirty years and more the Indians were 
a peril to American settlers in the eastern half of the Mis¬ 
sissippi Valley. 


Suggested Readings 

Histories: Parkman, The Struggle for a Continent (ed. P. Edgar),, 
Fiske, New France and New England, 98-132, 249-25G, 258-359. 
Roosevelt, Winning of the I Vest, I, 25-48. Cooke, Stories of the Old 
Dominion, 94-139. Wilson, Life of Washington. Morris, Half Hours 
with American History. 

Sources: Hart, American History Told hy Contemporaries, I, No. 
41;. II, 320-322, 346-349. 

Fiction: Hawthorne, Grandfather’s Chair, 140-169. 


CHAPTER XVI 
LIFE IN THE COLONIES 

201. Peculiarities of American Speech.— We are now 

ready for a study of some of the main features of colonial 
life, comparing them at times with English conditions. It is 
worth while to note at the beginning that even the speech of 
the colonists changed a little from what it was in England. 
Names for the new objects, actions, and experiences of the 
new world were introduced. The first Englishmen to see 
America had talked of Indian kings and dukes and of their 
palaces, but this was so absurd that men came in time to use 
the Indian words sachem and sagamore, and to call the wretch¬ 
ed bark houses of the Indians, wigwams, not palaces. “ Like 
Adam in the newly made world /’ says Eggleston, the colo¬ 
nists gave names “ to the fowls of the air and to every beast 
of the field.” Often this was done in the simplest way, as in 
the case of the bluebird, the mocking bird, catbird, canvas- 
back duck, and the black bear. The native American grain 


LIFE IN THE COLONIES 


123 


they called Indian corn, 1 and for its blossom they invented 
“ silk ” and “ tassel.” In the case of the squash the colorfists 
only used the last syllable of the very long Indian word. 
This making of a new language went on in another way. 
The mingling of men from various countries and from all 
parts of England resulted in each taking from or giving to 
the other some peculiar word or phrase. The American dia¬ 
lect came, as a result, to differ from any particular dialect 
used in England. 

202. Americans That Were Like Englishmen.—After sev¬ 
eral generations there came to be marked differences in the 
way the masses of the people lived in England and in America. 
Of the more than a million and a half people living in the colo¬ 
nies, only the wealthy planters of the South and the people 
in the few large cities 2 lived like Englishmen. There in the 
houses of the rich one might find solid oak and mahogany fur¬ 
niture imported from England, and silver plate and sparkling 
wines brought from Europe. 3 The owners imitated English 
gentlemen with their velvet coats ruffled with lace, white silk 
stockings below their knee breeches, and their shoes with 
buckles of silver. Men with long powdered hair which they 
twisted in a queue and tied with a black ribbon danced 
stately English dances with elegant ladies gowned in bro¬ 
caded silk dresses stiff enough to stand erect without their 
owners. But these people were not typical Americans. 

203. Life of the Common People.—The small farmers, the 
fishermen and the fur traders, dwelling in the wilderness or 
the small fishing or farming village, lived a very different life. 
If they had grown too prosperous to live in the dugouts, bark 


1 Indian dishes prepared from the new grain made necessary the 
Indian names hominy, pone, and succotash. 

2 The largest had only 20,000 people. 

3 Yet with all these luxuries they lacked many comforts we now 
have. They had no stoves, no gas, no kerosene, no telephones, no 
matches, no typewriters, no rubber coats or shoes, no sewing-machines, 
and no water-pipes in their houses. 



124 THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 

wigwams, or log cabins such as the first settlers had used, 
they might dwell in a house built of huge timbers, covered 
with rough, unpainted clapboards. There were no stoves or 
furnaces in that day, but in the center of the house was a 

great fireplace where on 
a wintry night blazed 
the logs which the pru¬ 
dent farmer had chopped 
and hauled from the forest. 
There was no coal to keep 
a steady fire all night, or 
handy friction match to 
light it if it died out. 
The benches, stools,, and 
tables were rough and 
homemade, and the beds 
were made soft with moss 
or the down of the cat-tail. 
This furniture, as well as 
all the nails and spikes and 
hinges in the house, the 
farmer and his sons made 
for themselves. Their 
food, brought to the table 
on trenchers or trays, was 
eaten in the early days 
from pewter or wooden dishes, but in later colonial times 
chinaware came into use. The cooking was done over 
open fires, in pots or kettles hung from a crane or an iron 
bar in the chimney, or in brick ovens, and the fare was 
simple, indeed, among the common people. Thus they 
were housed and fed. For clothing the farmer’s wife and 
daughter spun from the wool of their own sheep the stout 
“homespun” which was made up in the rough-patterned 
clothing that made such an odd figure of the common man in 
colonial days. 



A Corner of a Colonial Kitchen 









LIFE IN THE COLONIES 


125 


204. The Social Ranks.—Because so large a part of the 
American people were “men of the woods/' equally poor 
and equally uncultured, there was, except in the South, much 
equality in their social relations; yet they could not wholly 
rid themselves of the old-world notion that a man's first 
duty was to those above him in station—the king, the magis¬ 
trate, and other social superiors. The social distinctions 
were, however, different from those found in Europe, for the 
colonial laws did not set one man above another and give him 
special privileges because of the fortune of birth. There 
were no dukes and lords and bishops, though there was a 
social rank preserved by kinds of dress, by the respect shown 
to the upper class by 
the lower, and by the 
order in which people 
were seated in church. 1 
People of different so¬ 
cial ranks were rarely 
allowed to marry. Sons 
of ministers, lawyers, 
governors, and judges 
might not as a rule, 
marry daughters of far¬ 
mers, mechanics, or shop¬ 
keepers. In New Eng¬ 
land before 1649 few 
men were allowed to use the prefix Mr., but were ad¬ 
dressed merely as “ Goodman So-and-so." In Harvard 
College catalogues the names of students were arranged 
according to the social rank of their parents. Never¬ 
theless, the conditions in America tended to do away with 



The Kind of Fire Engine Used 
by the Colonists 


1 This order was decided by weighing the offices men held in town 
or church or trainband (militia). In Virginia and Maryland emblems 
of rank were sometimes placed on the pews of the governor, or the great 
families of the parish. 













126 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


even such slight distinctions. 1 Only in Virginia, where 
the great plantations were usually handed down, as in 
England, to the eldest son, and among the descendants of the 
lordly Dutch patroons of New York, was there much resem¬ 
blance to English aristocracy. 

205. The Three Sections.—The colonists not only differed 
in many matters from England, but each colony had customs 
and interests peculiar to itself, and the whole area of English 
settlements might be divided into three groups: (1) The 
eastern or New England colonies. 2 (2) The middle colo¬ 
nies. 3 (3) The southern colonies. 4 These local and sec¬ 
tional differences were due to two main causes. The first 
cause was the great difference between the climate and 
soil of the most northern and most southern colonies. The 
average yearly temperature of Maine is about that of south¬ 
ern Norway, while Georgia’s climate nearly resembles that of 
north Africa. New England’s rugged soil offered no such 
opportunity to the large planter as did the fertile river valleys 
of Virginia, or the rich coast and sea island district of South 
Carolina and Georgia. The occupations of men in the two 
sections were, as a matter of course, widely different. 

206. Means of Communication.—The second cause of 
local peculiarities was the lack of easy means of travel. 
There not only were no railroad tracks, with mighty engines 
dragging great trains a thousand miles in a day, but there were 
not even roads good enough to encourage travel by stage- 


1 These distinctions of social rank were gradually giving way under 
the influence of American life; for where land was cheap and oppor¬ 
tunities for rising in the world were plentiful, it was difficult to keep any 
lines of social difference. Benjamin Franklin, for example, the son of a 
poor tallow chandler in Boston, left his birthplace for Philadelphia, 
acquired property, educated himself, and became one of the great men 
of the day. 

2 New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut. 

3 New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Delaware. 

4 Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia. 



LIFE IN THE COLONIES 


127 



Traveling in Colonial Days 


coach. It was in 1756 that the first stagecoach, taking 
three days for the trip, ran between New York and 
Philadelphia, two of the largest cities of America. In the 
back country the ways were mere bridle paths, and the 
little travel men 
cared to under¬ 
take was done 
on horseback. 

Most of the co¬ 
lonial travel was 
done by sea, but 
there were no 


steamboats, and 
sailing up and 
down the rivers 
and along a dangerous coast was difficult and perilous. 
The modern mail service and the daily newspaper, aided 
by the telegraph and the telephone, had not yet come to 
make neighbors of men dwelling hundreds of miles apart. 
The postman on horseback, riding perhaps thirty miles a day, 

carried what few letters and papers 
men could afford to pay for. Because 
of all this, people as a rule stayed at 
home, ignorant of the way men lived 
even in the nearest colony, and keep¬ 
ing to their own manners and cus¬ 
toms. We shall see the effect of these 
facts when it becomes necessary for 
the colonies to act together. 

207. Industry in New England.—As 
a result of the different climate and 
soil, the occupations of men in New 

Colonial Tavern Sign England would seem strange to a 

man from the South. New England¬ 
ers could raise no great crops of tobacco or rice, so they 
cut down trees, built ships, and sailed out upon the sea 




























128 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


for whale or cod or mackerel. New England merchants, tak¬ 
ing cargoes of fish, flour, salt meats, and staves for barrels, 
sailed to the West India islands, whence they brought back 
sugar and molasses, or Spanish dollars with which to buy 
the goods they needed from England. Also they traded 
along the American coast, or sailed to England with lumber 
and furs, and brought back the manufactured goods, which 
the colonists had not yet begun to make in America. Some 
paper and beaver hats were made and leather was tanned, 
but manufacturing was chiefly confined to homemade things 
for family use. 1 Farmers there were, too, in New England, 
but except in the Connecticut Valley they made little more 
than a living from the rugged soil. 

208. Industry in the Middle Colonies.—The middle colo- 

m 

nies had less interest in fishing and trading than the New 
Englanders, but far more in farming. In New York the 
early Dutch traders had made friends of the Iroquois, and 
the fur trade with the Indians, thus made possible, was long 
a source of great wealth. The farms along the Hudson and 
on Long Island were also profitable, but it was the Pennsyl¬ 
vania farms that outrivaled those of any other part of the 
colonies in the production of cattle, grain, flour, and other 
provisions for both colonial and European markets. Lumber, 
too, was cut in large quantities, and the fur trade throve on 
the frontier. But for English laws forbidding them, manu¬ 
factures might have been started, and, even as it was, flour 
mills dotted the land, and iron and paper were notable 
products. 

209. Industry of the South.—South of Pennsylvania 
stretched a farming country of a different kind. There were 
no cities, and few large towns. Straggling villages, with 
tobacco warehouses, were about all the traveler saw, ex¬ 
cept the great seaport Charleston, whence the staple crops 
were shipped and where the planters gathered for social 

1 Manufactures which competed with English manufactures were for¬ 
bidden by law. 



life in the colonies 


129 


life. Large plantations in Maryland and Virginia produced 
tobacco as the chief crop. 1 * * * * * Farther south, in the Carolinas 
and Georgia, the chief crops were rice and indigo, raised 
on large plantations where numerous negro slaves were 
the pride of the great planter, who gave little heed to 
manufacturing, shipbuilding, and trade. 

210. Negro Slavery and Southern Conditions.—The rich 
soil and warm climate of the Southern States lent themselves 
to raising great staple crops—rice ? 
cotton, indigo, or tobacco—and since 
negroes could best endure the heat 
and unhealthy conditions on the 
sea islands and low coastal plains, 
they had seemed a necessity if the 
land was to be developed. Since 
they were mere barbarians when 
brought from Africa to America, 
there appeared to be no way to 
control them except to place them 
under an absolute master, or, in 
other words, to enslave them. Thus 
it was that throughout the planta¬ 
tion region v 7 here negro labor was 
most useful, the institution of slav¬ 
ery grew with rapid strides, while north of that region the 
number of slaves did not increase, though every colony had 



A House Slave of 
Washington’s Day 
S ketched from life. 


1 The great plantations of Virginia were like villages, where nearly 

everything was done that the life of the plantation demanded. Many 

things were brought from Europe or the North; but a big planter had 

among his slaves tanners, shoemakers, carpenters, blacksmiths, coop¬ 

ers, and weavers; cotton and wool were spun, cloth was woven, clothes 

were cut and made. The plantation under an able owner was a hive 
of industry. The stately mansion, the beautiful long avenue of ap¬ 

proach, the workshops, the lovely gardens, the shining negro cabins, 
the wide-stretching tobacco fields, the negroes singing at their work— 
such is the picture of the plantation at its best. 










130 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


a few at least. 1 We shall, indeed, see that slavery died 
out in the North, while year by year it fastened its evil influ¬ 
ence upon the South, until men became blind to its moral 
wrong. 2 

211. Government of Colonies. —In spite of the sectional dif¬ 
ferences that we have seen, and the varying interests of each 
colony, the colonies were all bound together by their common 
political beliefs, based on the principles of English freedom. 
Though in 1760 the colonies were divided into (1) charter 
colonies, 3 (2) proprietary colonies, 4 and (3) royal colonies, 5 
yet each had a legislature elected by the people, who thus had 
much influence in the making of the laws which governed 
them. Every colony was much in earnest in this matter of 
making its own laws, and, in spite of king or royal governor, 
managed usually to have its own way. The tendency oi 
these laws was toward greater freedom for each individual 
man than could be found in England or any European 
country. 

212. Local Government. —The difference in local govern- 


1 The slave could do the same task day after day fairly well, but he 
was of little use where the industry was diversified and every hour had 
its new problem. As a result of this and the cost of clothing a slave in 
the colder regions, slavery disappeared in the North. 

2 When slavery was first introduced into the South in colonial days, 
few men in the world thought it wrong, and by the time the world 
thought it wrong it had become so important to the planters that they 
defended it. 

3 Connecticut and Rhode Island (sometimes called corporate colonies). 

* Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Maryland. 

6 Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York, New Jersey, Virginia, 
North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia. 

In the first, the king practically made a contract with the colonists 
which limited the share of each—king and people—to the government 
of the colony. In the second, some man, called the proprietor, re¬ 
ceived a large tract of land from the king, and by charter could sell 
land, set up a government, and appoint governors. In the third, the 
king appointed the governors and told them how he wanted the colonists 
ruled. 



LIFE IN THE COLONIES 


131 


ment which has been noted—the township system of New 
England, the county system of the South, and the mixture of 



the two in the middle colonies—did not affect the political 
spirit of the several sections, but resulted only in the better 
political training of the average man in New England than 




























132 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


in the South. 1 Although the county officers of the southern 
colonies were chosen by the royal governor, yet they, were 
chosen from the neighborhood, from among the prominent 
planters with an aptitude for rule, and they were no less 
zealous than the New England mechanic or farmer to pre¬ 
serve the colonial liberties. On the whole, the American 
colonists had much more influence upon their government 
than did Englishmen. Though Americans seemed to have 
much the same political system that existed in England, yet 
the changed conditions had partly forced them and partly 
permitted them to advance faster in political growth. 

213. Religion in New England.—The importance of relig¬ 
ion varied in the several sections. In New England of early 
colonial times it was thought the duty of the Church to create 
a perfect Christian Society and that the State must use its 
power to furnish the right conditions for such society. 
Hence the State must punish idolatry, blasphemy, Sabbath¬ 
breaking, and all other offenses against religion. For this 
reason it was that a Harvard student who had spoken 
lightly of the Holy Ghost was publicly beaten, and a grace 
was said before and after the punishment. To-day we leave 
matters of religious and moral instruction to the Church, 
while the State regulates man’s conduct in secular affairs. 

214. Religious Peculiarities of the Puritans.—Puritans 
laid great stress upon the observance of the Sabbath. The 
consecrated time began at sunset Saturday evening. “We 
should rest from labor, much more from play,” wrote Cotton 
in his catechism “Milk for Babes.” Eating an apple or 
cracking a nut was by some thought an evil. In Boston the 
gate of the city was shut and the ferry guarded that none 
might go forth on the Sabbath. Not even on the hottest 
Sabbath day might one take air on Boston Commons. All 
must rest. Everybody must go to church, and as it was not 


1 Because every little while all freemen came together to discuss 
politics in the town meeting. 





LIFE IN THE COLONIES 


133 


the custom even in winter to heat the house of worship, devo¬ 
tion alone warmed the good Puritan fathers. One of them 
wrote of a Sabbath when the bread froze on the communion 
table, “ yet John Tuckerman was baptized. At 6 o’clock my 
ink freezes so that I can hardly write by a good fire in my 
wife’s chamber. Yet was very comfortable at meeting.” It 
is little wonder that such men were sturdy doers of what they 
thought right. 1 

215. Religion in the South.—In Virginia and the South 
there was no such intense religious life. Physical difficulties 
were in the way of religious observances. Where the water¬ 
side settlements, with the forest behind, were thinly strung 
out along the rivers and creeks, and where some plantations 
had neither exit nor entrance by land, the pioneers were 
obliged to go to church by sailing or paddling in sloop or dug- 
out. As some of the parishes were thirty miles or more in 
shore length, attendance on church depended somewhat 
upon the weather. Planters went to service when it was con¬ 
venient, and Sunday was not a rigorous Puritan Sabbath, 
but a day of leisure, of sport, and social pleasures. Vir¬ 
ginia also had the misfortune, because she favored the Angli¬ 
can Church, to have her clergy sent to her from England, and 
for a time there came many who had failed to obtain places 
in churches in England, and who were often, for one reason 
or anoth er, unfit for their calling. ____ 

1 Some doubted whether women ought to sing in church, thinking 
that only godly men should join in public singing. A scruple against 
music books resulted in musical notation being forgotten for a time in 
New England. Pleasure on the Sabbath was thought wrong, and 
church music was therefore opposed because it “ bewitched the mind 
with syrenes sounds.” The Puritans scrupled against giving heathen 
names to children, and New England records abound with curious 
Hebrew names, as well as nouns and verbs and participles like Love, 
Hope, Unite, Seaborn, Preserved, Wait-still, and Humility. Neither 
would they use pagan names for days, months, or seasons. New 
England produced many fine, noble men, and their descendants found 
good use for their “New England conscience” in many a later struggle 
to better the lot of mankind. 





134 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


216, Colonial Ignorance and Superstition.—It is hard for 

us to realize how ignorant and superstitious were the com¬ 
mon people of that age, in both America and Europe. The 
first colonists thought the stars to be flames hung in the 
heavens to light mankind, and that countless angels kept 
the world going around. Hornets were thought to come 
from the decaying bodies of horses, and honey bees from 
cattle. The colonial doctors were ignorant, and their 
patients more so. The parish priest, or the justice of the 
peace, was likely also to be the doctor, and his remedies were 
curious medicines, often made of ridiculous substances like 
pulverized butterflies, crickets, or grasshoppers, which were 
thought to cure because they disgusted. The doctors were 
quite unable to cope with the diseases which swept the colo¬ 
nies—“small pocks,” “ship fever,” “yellow fever,” “break- 
bone fever,” and “ague.” Barbers were often the only 
surgeons and they tried to cure many diseases by letting 
blood. There was no ether or chloroform, nor did surgeons 
have the fine instruments now used. Many of these beliefs 
and customs were passing away in the eighteenth century. 

217. Salem Witchcraft.—Everywhere there w r as supersti¬ 
tion in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, but in 
America the belief in the meddling of evil spirits was, per¬ 
haps, made stronger by life in the coast settlements between 
the wide sea and the mysterious forest filled with beasts and 
Indians. It was not strange, therefore, that there was in Sa¬ 
lem, in 1692, a cruel persecution of witches in which nineteen 
persons were hanged. These unfortunates were accused of 
making bargains with Satan, and with his power tormenting 
their enemies by sticking pins in them. Or perhaps the 
witches rode in air on broomsticks, or took part in a 
“ Devil’s Sabbath,” and acted in other absurd orgies. Dur¬ 
ing the same century in Europe there had been thousands 
of such persecutions of people believed to have dealt with 
evil spirits, and men in America had less reason to be wise 
in such matters than men in Europe. 


LIFE IN THE COLONIES 135 

218. Colonial Schools.—But, as we have already seen/ the 
beginnings had been made in America of a school system 
which after two centuries of struggle was to remove such 
ignorance and make even the average man too wise to be thus 
deceived. The impulse to establish public schools had 
started in England. The wave of zeal for founding new Latin 
schools reached its flood about the time that emigration to 
America began, and the impulse was felt in all the early colo- 


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Facsimile of Part of a Page of Poor Richard’s Almanac 

nies. Besides the New England schools, the Dutch started 
good schools in New York, and in New Jersey, after 1700, 
every county supported a school by taxation. Some public 
schools were early started in Philadelphia. Of these, the Penn 
Charter School (1689), the most famous, survives to-day. In 
the country towns of Pennsylvania the good German pastors 
taught the children of their own flocks. In the South public 
schools were few because the people lived far apart. In 


1 P. 65. 


















136 


THE ENGLISH IN NORTH AMERICA 


early days Governor Berkeley, thanked God that there 
were no free schools or newspapers in Virginia. He saw how 
they would help the poor man rise to power, and he did not 
wish that. A few schools sustained by gifts of rich men did 
spring up, however, both in Virginia and in South Caro¬ 
lina, but the wealthy planters usually had private tutors in 
their families. Some sent their sons to English colleges. 
There was but one college (William and Mary) in the South, 
while in the North there was at least one to each colony. 1 

219. Colonial Books.—Most of the few books found in 
America were brought from England. The books written in 
the colonies were chiefly pious, like the “ Bay Psalm Book ” 
(1640), dreary verses without rhyme or rhythm. An¬ 
other was Cotton Mather’s “ Magnalia,” confusing and 
tedious beyond description. A popular book with children 
was the “New England Primer,” with doggerel verses like* 

“ In Adam’s Fall, 

We sinned all,” 

“ Zaccheus he 
Did climb the Tree 
Our Lord to see.” 

Among the illustrations was a picture of a man burning 
at the stake because he did not believe in the established 
church. 

In the middle of the eighteenth century a famous book 
that came once a year into the family was Benjamin Frank¬ 
lin’s “ Poor Richard’s Almanac.” Besides the calendar of 
days and months, this almanac contained pieces of good ad¬ 
vice suited to simple folk of that day. 2 3 “ Little strokes fell 
great oaks” taught the lesson of perseverance, and “It is 

1 Harvard in Massachusetts, Yale in Connecticut, Brown in Rhode 

Island, Dartmouth in New Hampshire, Kings in New York, Princetoi 
in New Jersey, and University of Pennsylvania in Pennsylvania. 

3 See them summed up in Franklin’s “Way to Wealth.” 



LIFE IN THE COLONIES 


137 


hard for an empty bag to stand upright ” taught the need of 
thrift. “ If you will not hear Reason, be warned that she 
will surely rap your knuckles.’’ This almanac, published 
by the greatest of colonial printers, was one of the most suc¬ 
cessful publications of that day. 

220. Colonial Newspapers.—Besides this almanac Franklin 
published one of the best of colonial newspapers, but not the 
first, for the first issue of the Boston News Letter (1704) was 
printed before he was born. In the day when there was no 
cable, telegraph, telephone, or fast train to carry the mails, 
and when a printing press took a day to do what our presses 
can do in a minute, the newspaper was quite different from 
our modern dailies. The first daily paper, the Pennsylvania 
Packet, was a source of wonder in its day. Humble as was 
the colonial press, it was freer in the expression of opinion 
than any other press of the world. Free speech was seriously 
threatened but once in America. In 1732 Peter Zenger, a 
New York editor, found fault with Governor Cosby, and 
was therefore imprisoned and brought to trial. A Phila¬ 
delphia Quaker lawyer pleaded his case, declaring in his 
speech, “It is not the cause of a poor printer of New 
York alone, which the jury is now trying. It is the cause of 
liberty! ” Zenger was acquitted in spite of every effort of 
the governor to convict him. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: Lodge, Short History of the English Colonies. Eg¬ 
gleston, Household History, 91-113. Fiske, New France and New 
England, 133-196. Eggleston, The Transit of Civilization. Scudder, 
Men and Manners One Hundred Years Ago. Earle, Stage Coach and 
Tavern Days, Two Centuries of Costume, and Home Life in Colonial 
Days. Stockton, Buccaneers and Pirates. 

Sources: Hart, Source Book, 88-119. Hart, American History Told 
hy Contemporaries, I, Nos. 138, 149; II, Nos. 16, 17, 18, 82, 83, 84, 
85, 94, 95, 105, 106, 107. Hart, Source Readers, No. I, 201-223; No. 
II, 1-69. 


Ill 

PERIOD OF POLITICAL REVOLUTION AND 
WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 


CHAPTER XVII 

CAUSES OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION 

221. England’s Great Problem.—The study of American 

colonial life up to 1763, and a few comparisons with English 
life of that period reveal some truths that might well have 
worried the British statesmen who now had the task of ruling 
a great empire instead of little England—girt by “ the four 
seas.” The colonists had come to have interests different 
from England’s in trade and industry, and their life in the 
wilderness gave them new ideas of government, new ideas as 
to how men should live, and a feeling of independence, due to 
isolation—three thousand miles of ocean rolling between the 
colony and mother country. If the rulers of England hoped 
to keep America in the empire they must be as wise as ever 
men had been. Good feeling between England and America 
could alone keep them united, while dissatisfaction would 
make impossible any union save by force, and that could not 
last. 

222. American Conditions.—After the triumph of Wolfe 
on the Plains of Abraham, the English colonists felt more sure 
than before that they could get along without England’s mil¬ 
itary aid, for the French foes were gone and the Indian ene¬ 
mies were weakened. Besides, the colonies had worked to¬ 
gether and had learned their common interests as never 
before. Larger numbers of colonists were pushing back 
from the coast, some even beyond the mountains, and 
these, feeling more rarely England’s controlling hand, feared 
and heeded it less. The colonists, it is true, gloried much 
in the name of Englishmen at this time, when England was 

138 


CAUSES OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION 139 


at the height of her power, but they had been angered by 
the sneers of some of the English officers at the colonial 
soldiers, who, though they had fought well, had not fought 
in the regular European way. These slight weaknesses in 
the bonds which held the colonies to the home land were in¬ 
creased by the difference in the interests of each. 

223. English Way of Looking at Colonists.—England 
was, on the whole, more generous to her colonies than 
were other nations to theirs, but she did not give much 
weight to colonial interests when they conflicted with those 
of the home country. Englishmen approved of this treat¬ 
ment, for the colonist who had left England to face the 
perils of the American wilds was looked upon as an inferior. 
As Benjamin Franklin said: “ Every man in England seems 
to jostle himself into the throne with the king and talks about 
‘our subjects’ in America.” 

224. The British Control of American Trade.—Acting 
upon the theory that colonies existed only to enrich the 
country that founded them, Parliament began to regulate 
the American trade so as to give all its profits to British 
merchants. Colonial trade was made to pass through 
Great Britain. The American must, as a rule, ship his to¬ 
bacco, rice, or indigo to a British port, where he must buy of 
an English merchant any desired foreign product, such as the 
French silks and Chinese teas, which no colonial merchant was 
allowed to buy direct from France or China. Again, British 
manufacturers wanted to sell their goods in America, and in 
order to keep this market for them the Americans were for¬ 
bidden to make such goods as Englishmen wished to sell. 
Even the English farmers were “ protected ” by putting 
high customs duties upon American wheat, rye, peas, beans, 
and oats exported to England. 

To aid English planters in the West Indies, Parliament 
passed the Sugar Act (1733), which sought to force Amer¬ 
ican colonists to buy sugar and molasses of English planters 
rather than from the Spanish or French. This act caused 


140 


WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 


much irritation and would have been very harmful to the 
New England traders but for the fact that it was not strictly 
enforced. Smuggling was common because everyone be¬ 
lieved it was right to resist the unjust laws. 1 

225. Writs of Assistance.—Smuggling became particu¬ 
larly offensive during the war with France, when the colo¬ 
nists carried on an illegal trade with the enemy. Evasion of 
the law was so common that it was hard to get witnesses who 
would testify against an offender. All believed the tax laws 
to be unjust and arbitrary. An ordinary writ or warrant 
giving an officer the right to search a special house men¬ 
tioned in the writ was of no avail, so “ writs, of assistance ” 
were resorted to. These gave the officers a right to search 
where they would—to invade any house, in spite of the old 
saying “ An Englishman’s house is his castle.” A test case 
came up in the Massachusetts courts to find whether such 
writs were legal (1761). The brilliant colonial lawyer 
James Otis—“ A flame of fire,” “-Isaiah and Ezekiel united,” 
as John Adams said of him—argued against the writs, declar¬ 
ing that Parliament could not legalize tyranny. 2 In a purely 
legal view he was not right, but the immense popularity of 
Otis’ argument showed what Americans believed, and a wise 
statesman would not have acted against their wishes. 

226. The “ Parson’s Cause.”—Not in New England alone 
was the “ fierce spirit of liberty ” shown. The Virginians 
had made a law providing for the payment of clergymen’s 
salaries and all debts in money instead of tobacco, as 
formerly. 3 This the king had vetoed. When the veto was 

1 These regulations, up to the time of which we are speaking (1760- 
1775), did not injure America much or cause much ill-feeling. But 
when England tried to tax the colonists, the colonists naturally said, 
“You are managing the trade of the whole empire for your benefit, 
why tax us in addition?” 

2 He said that such acts “had cost one king of England his head and 
another his throne.” 

3 Tobacco was high that year and worth more than the money offered 
in its place. 



CAUSES OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION 141 


unheeded, a clergyman brought suit to get his salary in 
accord with the king’s wishes. Against the “parson” in the 
trial was Patrick Henry, a hitherto unknown country lawyer 
but a sincere lover of liberty, who made his reputation by 
declaring with marvelous eloquence that there was a limit to 
the legal control which the king might exert over colonial law¬ 
making. A king, by vetoing a law for the good of his people, 
argued Henry, “ degenerates into a tyrant, and forfeits all 
right to his subjects’ obedience.” In the end the case was 
decided in favor of the “parson,” but the jury gave him 
only one penny damages, and there were no more suits in 
Virginia. Eloquent young orators, both in Virginia and 
Massachusetts, had now declared against unlimited control 
of the colonies. 1 

227. The “Imperial Policy.”—Such defiance should have 
been a warning against any further interference in colonial 
affairs, but, in the face of this lesson, the ministers of the 
new king, George III, made plans that were sure to enrage 
the colonists. New officers with more powers were to en¬ 
force the colonial trade laws, and there was to be supported 
in America a regular army large 
enough to defend the colonies against 
Indians and foreign foes. 

228. The Stamp Act.—To pay part 
of this great increase of expense, the 
Prime Minister, Grenville, caused 
Parliament (March, 1765) to pass a 
colonial stamp act like one in force in 
England. By its terms all licenses to 
marry, all deeds of property, all bonds 
or bills of sale and other legal docu¬ 
ments had to be written on stamped paper, costing from one 
cent to fifty dollars, or they were not legal. It would bring 



A Colonial Stamp 


1 That the people’s will, not kingly sanction, makes a law valid, was 
Henry’s declaration, startling in that day, though commonplace now. 






























































































142 


WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 


the tax collector to every door in the colonies, and yet the 
consent of Americans was not asked nor were their repre¬ 
sentatives given any part in making the law 

229. Stamp Act Congress.—The wrath of the colonists 
when the news came to America was hot, indeed. In the 
Virginia House of Burgesses sat young Patrick Henry, just 
elected, and very impatient with the calm ways of the older 
members. Tearing a leaf from an old law book, he 




The TIMES »r« 
Dmrtful, 
JDifinal 
©Ot/fill 
tDol«nmjr»nd 
Doj.iA.r-tu*. 


PENNSYLVANIA JOURNAL; 


'ThurOty, 1765 


TVUA1B. 119$. 


WEEKLY ADVERTISER 


EXPIRING'* la llopes of a Refurrection io Life again. 


AM Carry lobe obliged, 
to acquaint my Reed- 
-wa.thata* TheSTAan*- 
Act, ijfitnr’d to beob- 
ligttory uponu* after I 

th aFu-Jtif 

•fuing, (the/bwab m*] 
l/vw; thePuhnlherof this P«penm»ble +0' 


I bear the Burthen, ha* thought it el pedientl 
ro stop awhile, in order loddiberate,whe¬ 
ther any Method* can he jbund to elude the 
Chains forged for tis. end efoape the mfujv 
portahle Slavery, which it is hoped, frcen 
the left Kepreientatione now made .gainll 
IhalAA, may be affedad. Mean while,j 
1 mult eamelUy Requeft every TodiriJual 


I of my Subtcribers -many of whom have 
been long behind Hand, that thay would, 
immediately Diftharge thetr refpedive Ar¬ 
rears that 1 may be able, not only to l 
fuppott myielf during the Interval, bull 
be batter prepend to proceed again with I 
this f apen wlienever an opening (or that I 
jPurpefe appears, which 1 hope will be 

|C*>n. WILLIAM BRADFORD 


A Newspaper Broadside Published the Day before the 
Stamp Act Went into Effect 


wrote some fiery resolutions to the effect that the colonial 
assembly alone had the right to lay taxes on the colony of 
Virginia. With burning words, we are told, he denounced 
the tyranny, ending with the famous phrases, “ Caesar and 
Tarquin had each his Brutus, Charles I, his Cromwell, and 
George III ”—“ Treason! treason!” shouted the Speaker— 
“ may profit by their example,” Henry finished slowly, add¬ 
ing, “ If this be treason, make the most of it.” 

The radical resolutions were carried, and Henry’s daring 







CAUSES OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION 143 


found an echo nearly everywhere. The Massachusetts rep¬ 
resentatives called for a general congress of the colonies. 
Nine colonies responded, and the Stamp Act Congress, 1 as 
it was called, addressed memorials to the king and a 
“ Declaration of Rights and Grievances of the Colonists 
in America. ” 2 


230. Stamp Act Riots.—Unhappily, not every protest was 
so dignified. Throughout America tax collectors’ houses 
were rifled, their lives threatened, 
and their records and stamps 
burned so that there was no legal 
paper even for the most impor¬ 
tant documents. Flags were hung 
at half mast, shops shut, and news¬ 
papers were issued with a death ; s 
head where a stamp should have 
been. In New York the “ Sons 
of Liberty ” were organized. They 
and other colonists dressed in 
homespun to avoid buying clothes 





made in England. This refusal 
to buy English goods aroused 
British merchants to demand the repeal of the offensive 
act. 

231. Repeal of Stamp Act.—When the British Parliament 
found that it had tried, as Burke said, to shear a wolf instead 
of a lamb, it began seriously to examine the wisdom of the 


1 The congress was held in New York, in October, 1765. The 
people early learned that in union was strength; but many lessons 
had to be learned before they saw clearR how to form a lasting union. 

2 The important declarations were that (1) the colonists were en¬ 
titled to all the rights and liberties of subjects born in England; (2) 
the colonists, like other Englishmen, should be taxed only by their own 
representatives, but the colonists could not be represented in Parlia¬ 
ment; (3) it was unconstitutional for the colonists to have their 
property given to the king by any but their own legislatures; (4) trial 
by jury and the right of petition are privileges of every British subject. 







144 


WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 


Stamp Act. The advice of Benjamin Franklin, the famous 
American printer then in England on colonial business, was 
sought. Franklin had won world-wide fame by bringing 
electricity down from the clouds by means of a kite and 
string, and he had gained great respect from all men. When 
examined at the bar of the House of Commons, he sought to 
point out how hopeless was the task of taxing the colonies 
against their will. 1 

The great English statesman Pitt dared to say, “ I rejoice 
that America has resisted.” “ If they had yielded,” he said, 
“ it would have been an ill omen for English liberty.” 2 At 
last, chiefly as a result of the complaints of British merchants, 
the Stamp Act was repealed. Bonfires and votes of thanks 
greeted this action both in America and England. The Sons 
of Liberty ceased to meet and all seemed quiet. 

232. Taxation Without Representation.—The great objec¬ 
tion raised by the Americans was that they were taxed by 
Parliament without being represented in it, but the idea of 
representation common in England was such that America’s 
objection seemed foolish. The English believed that a rep¬ 
resentative from any part of England represented the whole 
nation. The colonial idea was that the voter and the repre¬ 
sentative voted for must be residents of the same district. 
The voters of any district had the right to send one of their 
own citizens to any assembly if they were to be really repre¬ 
sented. In America, as a rule, new towns or counties sent 
new representatives to the colonial assembly. 

In England, only the old towns which had long had the right 
sent representatives, and few Englishmen saw how unfair 


1 “ What used to be the pride of the Americans? ” he was asked. “ To 
indulge in the fashions and manufacture of Great Britain/’ he answered. 
11 What is now their pride?” “ To wear their old clothes over again 
till they can make new ones.” 

2 “ Three millions of people so dead to all the feelings of liberty, as 
voluntarily to submit to be slaves would have been fit instruments 
to make slaves of the rest.” 



L. Winnipeg 



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wosp^ri 




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ENGLISH AND □□ SPANISH POSSESSIONS 











CAUSES OU THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION 145 

this was. They asked only that there be “ no taxation 
except that voted by the House of Commons,” and they 
thought America was represented as much as Birmingham 
and other English cities which had grown up in recent years 
and which sent no representatives to Parliament. The 
Americans denied this and pointed out that in England 
the interests of men who elected representatives and those 
who did not were the same, because all dwelt in the same 
land, while in far-off America there were manj^ men with 
interests that English members of the House of Commons 
could not understand. 1 

233. Townshend Acte—With the repeal of the Stamp Act 
was passed a “ Declaratory Act ” asserting Parliament’s 
right to make laws for the colonies “ in all cases whatsoever.” 
This threat did not worry the colonists, until in 1767 Charles 
Townshend took advantage of it to raise more taxes in 
America. He thought, or seemed to think, from what the 
colonists had said about internal taxation, like the Stamp 
Tax, that they would not object to taxes collected at the 
seaports in form of customs duties on articles like tea, 
paints, paper, glass, and lead. The substitution of external 
for internal taxation in the bill which Parliament now 
passed was only a thin sugar coating over the bitter pill 
inside, for “ writs of assistance ” were again legalized, and 
the revenue from the taxation was to be used to remove 
the governors and judges from popular control by paying 
their salaries. The colonists were quick to show their re¬ 
sentment. 

234. Samuel Adams.—In Massachusetts a great revolu¬ 
tionary leader now came to the front. Samuel Adams, “ the 
man of the town meeting ”—for there he had hitherto done 
his most effective work for American liberty—was now 
clerk of the Massachusetts Assembly. He was a great 

1 Americans did not ask the right to send members to the English 
Parliament; they claimed that as they did not send members, they 
ought not to be taxed save in their own assembly. 




146 


WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 


and democratic leader. He was intimate with all classes, 
from the rough watermen of Boston to the ministers. 
Though gray, with palsied hand and a trembling voice, he 
was tactful and cool, a very “ Colossus ” in debate. 1 He 
now urged the Assembly to send out addresses, and a circular 
letter of his writing was sent to the other colonial assemblies 
urging united action against the Townshend acts. The king 
demanded that the letter be recalled and that other assem¬ 
blies refuse to receive it, but his command was defied. More¬ 
over, many bound themselves, like Samuel Adams, “ to eat 
nothing, drink nothing, wear nothing ” coming from Eng¬ 
land until the hateful duties were removed. 

235. Efforts to Stop Rebellion Make It Worse.—The king 
and his obedient ministers now thought that they must crush 
what they considered to be a spirit of rebellion. Their first 
mistake was to threaten to remove to England for trial, per¬ 
sons charged with treason. The sacred right of an Englishman 
to be tried by a jury of his neighbors was endangered, and 
Virginia’s legislature boldly declared such removal would be 
“ derogatory to the rights of British subjects.” A second 
mistake was the sending to America of an inadequate force of 
soldiers, which only irritated and did not cow the colonists. 
In Boston, whither troops were sent after a riot following the 
seizure of John Hancock’s sloop Liberty on a charge of smug¬ 
gling, the people were offended by the sound of fife and drum 
on Sunday and by quarrels between soldiers and citizens. 

236. The “ Boston Massacre.”—At last (1770), during such 
a conflict, forty or fifty men armed with sticks and stones 
surrounded a small force of red-coated British soldiers and 
shouted “Lobsters! Bloody backs!” The alarmed soldiers 
fired into the mob, killing five and wounding six. At once 
drums were beaten and church bells rung, and at the town 
meeting next day Samuel Adams demanded and secured the 

1 He wrote much for the newspapers, and his biting pen was 
feared by his enemies. Sincere, honest, and incorruptible, he was 
perhaps the most important single factor in bringing on the Revolution. 



CAUSES OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION 147 


removal of all the soldiers to an island in Boston Bay. 1 The 
‘Boston Massacre” was, in the colonists’ eyes, the result of 
substituting military for civil government, and they never 
forgave the foolish statesmen who were really to be blamed 
for making such a fatal quarrel possible by first sending and 
then by failing to remove the exasperating army. 

237. Committees of Correspondence.—Samuel Adams now 
persuaded the Boston town meeting to appoint a committee 



The Boston Massacre 
From an etching by Paul Revere. 


to write to and receive letters from other towns where com¬ 
mittees were soon formed on the Boston model. These 
“ Committees of Correspondence ” could not be dissolved or 
browbeaten as might the colonial assembly, and they proved 
most useful in binding together the men who were resisting 
the British Government and leading a revolution against it. 

1 The soldiers that fired were tried later by a Boston jury, and de¬ 
fended by John Adams and Josiah Quincy. They were acquitted, save 
two, who were lightly punished. 






















































148 


WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 


Working in every town, they urged men on, set war itself in 
motion, and when the royal government was at last overthrown, 
kept order in many cases until a new government was created. 

238. The "Gaspee Affair” and Intercolonial Committees. 
—This method of getting men to act together was soon ex¬ 
tended, for a system of intercolonial committees of corre¬ 
spondence came into existence. As a result of the irri¬ 
tating conduct of the English revenue cutter Gaspee, some 
Rhode Island men seized and burned this vessel while it was 
aground in Narragansett Bay (1772). The English Govern¬ 
ment, in anger, appointed a commission to find out the cul¬ 
prits, threatening to send them to England for trial. To 
watch the work of the “Gaspee Commission/’ Virginia’s 
Assembly, which, as we have seen, stanchly defended the 
colonists’ right to be tried by juries of their neighbors, ap¬ 
pointed a Committee of Correspondence, which induced 
other colonies to choose like committees. Now all the colo¬ 
nies could act in unison—the nerves of revolution soon ran 
through all the American political body. 

239. The Tea Act.—How well this system of communi¬ 
cation would work was soon shown. The Townshend meas¬ 
ures had been repealed (1770) because of the clamor of 
British merchants when Americans refused to buy in Eng¬ 
land. But, though the tax on other articles was repealed, 
the tax on tea was left. The Americans were still taxed 
without representation, and though the tax was small, the 
principle was a great one. The colonists refused to buy tea, 
and the British Government decided to find out how far the 
Americans were sincere as to the principle involved. It was 
arranged that the East India Company might ship tea to the 
colonists at a price so low that even with the duty added 
it might still be purchased cheaper than ever before. 

240. The “ Boston Tea Party ” and the “ Five Intolerable 
Acts.”—America was not to be bribed. Shiploads of tea 
sent to Charlestown and Philadelphia were seized or sent 
back to England. In Boston, a mass meeting demanded the 



1 Ninety thousand dollars’ worth of tea was destroyed. 

2 One act remodeled the Massachusetts charter. Another closed 
the port of Boston, so that not even hay from Charlestown could be 
brought in. A third provided for trying in England British soldiers 


The Colonists and the Tax Collector 
Facsimile of a contemporary British cartoon. 

This determined act, so costly to the East India Company, 
was viewed with great anger in England, and in retaliation 
Parliament passed what are known as the “ Intolerable Acts.” 2 


CAUSES OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION 149 

return of the tea ships that sailed into the harbor. The 
royal officers refused, and, peaceful means failing, a band 
of men disguised as Indians threw the tea overboard, and 
the next morning it lay like seaweed on the harbor beach. 1 


















































150 


WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 


When the news reached America that Boston was to be 
punished, the sympathy of every colony was carried thither 
as fast as horse and rider could take the news from town 
to town. Soon clothes, sheep, rice, and everything need¬ 
ful were being hurried to the relief of Boston. George 
Washington, far away in Virginia, offered to equip a thou¬ 
sand men with his own money and hurry them to the 
relief of Boston. Patrick Henry again electrified the Vir¬ 
ginia leaders by his daring prophecy, “We must fight. I 
repeat it, sir, we must fight.” 

241. First Continental Congress.—Alarmed lest they be 
next attacked, all the other colonies, urged on by Virginia 
and New York, resolved to hold a congress in which colonial 
leaders might talk matters over and decide upon a common 
action. In September (1774) the First Continental Con¬ 
gress met in Carpenter’s Hall, Philadelphia. From Virginia 
came her greatest leaders—George Washington, Patrick 
Henry, and Richard Henry Lee. From Pennsylvania came 
John Dickinson, whose famous “Farmer’s Letters,” which 
had set forth the wrongs of the colonists, made all curious to 
see the writer. From Massachusetts came the “ Brace of 
Adamses ”—Samuel and John—who were regarded in Eng¬ 
land as arch traitors, leaders of the American rebellion. 
John Jay, whose fame was to grow brighter every year, 
came from New York. The greatest Americans, except 
Franklin and Jefferson, sat in that first meeting for common 
action. Slowly the colonists had learned the lesson of unit¬ 
ing for strength. * 1 

who committed offenses in America. A fourth forced the colonists to feed 
and shelter the soldiers sent to punish them. Finally, the Quebec act was 
passed uniting with that province some western land claimed by Virginia, 
New York, Connecticut, and Massachusetts, thus offending them all. 

1 First, the New England Confederation; next, the meeting of 
colonial delegates at Albany (1754) for mutual defense, and then the 
Stamp Act Congress had gradually taught what might be done by union. 
Now all the colonies except Georgia—and part of her colonists were 
sympathetic—had met to aid each other in keeping their liberties. 



CAUSES OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION J51 

242. Declaration of Rights.—The members of the Con¬ 
gress were calm, thoughtful men for the most part, and they 
did not mean to fight if solemn protest and peaceful measures 
would avail. They drew up various addresses, and also a 
Declaration of Rights, asserting their right to life, liberty, 
and property, their right to tax themselves, and their right 
to petition for redress of grievances. 

243. “Articles of Association.”—The delegates then bound 
the citizens of all the colonies “under the sacred ties of Vir¬ 
tue, Honor, and Love of our Country,” to buy no more 
British goods. 1 Finally, the Congress declared it to be the 
duty of all the colonies to support Boston in resisting Brit¬ 
ish efforts to punish its people. As a newspaper of the time 
said, “One soul animates three millions of brave Americans, 
though extended over a long tract of three thousand miles.” 

244. Loyalists.—This was not quite true, for there were 
many people in America who did not approve of the Conti¬ 
nental Congress or its measures. They honestly believed 
that union with Great Britain was for America’s best good, 
and feared that the present struggle would end in breaking 
the bond. Many prosperous and contented men, many law¬ 
yers, doctors, and men of high social rank were alarmed at 
what seemed to them the madness of the “mob.” The 
Crown officers and their relatives and friends were certain to 
be found among these “Tories,” as the Loyalists were 
called. 

245. Pitt and Burke.—But if Americans were divided, so 
were Englishmen. Pitt and Burke and some of the greatest 
of English statesmen were eager to conciliate America. 2 Pitt 
thought that “for solidity of reasoning, force of sagacity, and 
wisdom of conclusion no nation or body of men can stand in 
preference to the General Congress at Philadelphia.” Be- 

1 The Committees of Correspondence everywhere were ordered to 
denounce as an enemy “to the liberties of this country” any man who 
refused to join this association. 

2 Later Fox became a famous champion of America’s cause. 




152 WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 

hind Pitt and Burke stood many thousands of Englishmen 
eager to be friends with America, but the king and his 
ministers, with the governing power in their own hands, 
were stubbornly resolved to bring the American colonies 
to their knees, crush rebellion, and rule as they chose. As 
a result, when next they heard from Boston, they learned 
that war had begun. 


Suggested Readings 

Histories: Fiske, History of the American Revolution , I. Eggles¬ 
ton, Household History , 148-158. Cooke, Stories of the Old Dominion, 
162-218. Tyler, Patrick Henry. Hosmer, Samuel Adams. Van Tyne, 
Loyalists , ch. I. Sloane, French War and the Revolution, 116-202. 
Magill, Stories from Virginia History. 

Sources: Hart, Source Readers, No. II, 153-180. Hart, American 
History Told by Contemporaries, II, Nos. 131, 133, 138, 139, 140, 142, 
143, 148, 151, 152, 158. (Otis’ and Henry’s Speeches) American Ora¬ 
tions. Old South Leaflets, No. 68. Mace, Working Manual of American 
History, 139-184. 

Fiction: Longfellow, Paul Revere's Ride. Holmes, Ballad of the 
Boston Tea Party. Hawthorne, Grandfather's Chair, 182-239. 


CHAPTER XVIII 


WAR BEGINS IN NEW ENGLAND 


246. General Gage Sent to Boston. — When Parliament 

decided to punish Boston, the king sent General Gage there 
to rule with British soldiers. So resentful were the colonists 
of this intrusion that carpenters would not work for him, 
farmers would not sell to him, and only by sending to London 
could he get supplies. The Massachusetts Legislature refused 
to do his will, changed itself into a 11 Provincial Congress,” 1 
and created a “committee of safety,” which was to collect 
guns and powder and shot, and form companies of “minute- 



1 Under this name they thought of themselves as getting their power 

from the people and not from the king. 



WAR BEGINS IN NEW ENGLAND 153 

men ” 1 to defend the people’s liberties, if Gage menaced 
them. 

247. Battle of Lexington. —When Gage sent out British 
troops to seize the powder and shot stored at Concord, and, if 
possible, to seize the patriot leaders, 

Samuel Adams and John Hancock, at 
Lexington, 2 the minutemen on the 
road knew that the troops were com¬ 
ing. Trusty riders like Paul Revere, 
warned by lights hung in the Old 
North Church, had carried the news 
through the night. As the British 
soldiers, who had left Boston at mid¬ 
night, neared Lexington in the early 
morning of April 19, 1775, Adams and 
Hancock had been warned and enabled 
to escape, but on the village green 
stood a line of Massachusetts militia¬ 
men. “Disperse, ye rebels!” shouted 
the British commander, but they held 
their ground as the British troops 
“rushed on shouting and huzzaing previous to the firing.” 
Returning a few scattered shots to the first volley, the little 
patriot band retired, leaving several of their companions 
dying upon the green. 

248. Battle of Concord. —From Lexington the British 
“ redcoats ” marched to Concord, seven miles farther on. 
Though beaten back by the “ embattled farmers ” at Con¬ 
cord bridge, they spiked some cannon, and threw some 
powder and balls into the river. Retreating then toward 
Boston, the hot day and the long march made them eager 
for rest, but by this time they had stirred up a hornet’s nest. 

1 Militiamen who were to be ready on the minute to spring to 
arms. 

2 There was talk of having the heads of the two “rebels” exhibited 
in London soon. 



A Minuteman 

From a monument in Lex¬ 
ington, Massachusetts. 



154 


WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 


From behind every hedge and tree, stone fence, or hillock, 
came the deadly fire of the enraged farmers. The march 
became a retreat, the retreat a flight, and when, on their 
headlong way to Boston, they met reenforcements under 
Lord Percy, “ their tongues were hanging out like dogs.” 
Two hundred and seventy-three dead or wounded “ redcoats ” 
marked the crimson trail from Concord to Boston. 1 Only 



From an etching by Doolittle, copied from a drawing made after the battle. 


under the guns of the British warships did the wretched 
survivors dare throw their tired bodies down to rest. By the 
next morning Boston was a besieged town, and from all New 
England men were hurrying tc the camp fires of the be¬ 
siegers. War had at last come. 

249. Siege of Boston.—It was a strange army that had 
gathered there. They had no fine trappings like the British 
soldiers. The variety of dress was really confusing, for 


1 The American loss was 93. 









































WAR BEGINS IN NEW ENGLAND 


155 


uniforms like those of British regulars were to be seen side by 
side with the hunting shirts of backwoodsmen, and even the 
blankets of savages. One could not tell an officer from a pri¬ 
vate by the uniform, nor one band from another. All New 



Boston and its Vicinity in 1776. 


England had poured out, but each colonial band of militia 
had its own leader. John Stark led the New Hampshire men; 
Israel Putnam, reputed to have slain a wolf in the animal’s 
very den, had left his plow to lead the Connecticut minute- 
men; and Nathaniel Greene, a Rhode Island blacksmith, led 
the men from his colon}". Though all wanted to help Boston, 
yet it was a question whether all would work together. 

250. Second Continental Congress.—To this question the 
colonies seemed to be answering “ yes,” for even while the 
minutemen were gathering about Boston, the Whigs, or Pa¬ 
triots, everywhere in America 1 were electing delegates to a 
Second Continental Congress, for which the first had pro¬ 
vided before adjourning. It was a stormy election in some 
colonies, for the Whigs set upon the Tories and were in turn 
attacked. 


1 Except in Georgia, where the Loyalists were too strong. 














156 WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 

251. Persecution of the Tories.—When men spoke against 
Congress or the rights of the colonies, Whig committees pub¬ 
lished their names to make them infamous, or confined them 
in jails until they recanted; they could not buy or sell, 
or hire labor, or get millers to grind their corn. Mobs tarred 
and feathered them, or chased them to the woods and 
swamps. One was tied upon a tavern sign in company with 


Tarring a Loyalist 

Facsimile of a contemporary French cartoon. 

a dead wild cat. Their effigies were hanged and burned, and 
their coaches pulled to pieces, while fine estates, where was 
“ every beauty of art, or nature, every elegance ,” which it 
had cost years to perfect, were laid waste. With such bitter 
strife was the Second Continental Congress elected. Though 
the country must have been almost equally divided, the 
Whigs were most active, and succeeded in electing a Congress 
which was bent upon defending “ American liberties,” or, in 
other words, forcing England to take back all her taxing laws 
and harsh measures. 



























WAR BEGINS IN NEW ENGLAND 


157 


252. Power of the Congress.—When Congress met, May 
10, 1775, the members meant to go slowly. They would 
humbly petition the king again, 1 * * * * * and ask him to prevent war 
by recalling his soldiers and repealing the unjust laws, but 
meanwhile the English army was not to be allowed to gain 
any advantage. W ithout money, without laws, and without 
power to form a government, Congress did what it could to 
defend the colonies from harm. Its power lay in the fact 
that every true W 7 hig in the land stood ready to act as Con¬ 
gress directed. It began work with great care, but was car¬ 
ried on and on until it found itself the directing head of 
the American people at war with the powerful British 
Government. 

253. Ethan Allen Takes Ticonderoga.—The delegates had 
hardly gathered in Philadelphia from the distant colonies 
north and south, when they were asked to approve an act of 
offensive war. A band of New Englanders, under Ethan 
Allen of Vermont, had marched to Fort Ticonderoga on Lake 
Champlain and surprised it at night. Allen, marching to the 
room of the sleeping commander, demanded surrender of the 
fort “ in the name of the Great Jehovah and the Continental 
Congress.” There was nothing else to do and the fort was 
surrendered (May 10, 1775). 

254. Congress Acts.—Reluctant as Congress was, it must 
go on. It needed money and it was forced to print paper 
money or bills of credit, which were paid out for guns, powder, 
and balls, and for food for the army about Boston. It 
needed a swift means of sending letters from colony to col¬ 
ony and it created a post office. It needed an army—and 
after a time a navy—and it devised a plan for each. Finally, 
Congress created the office of commander-in-chief of the Con- 

1 This “olive branch of peace,” as the second petition to the king 

was called, was drafted by the Congress early in July. The king 

refused to see the bearer of the petition, and even before it was for¬ 

mally delivered to his ministers, issued a proclamation declaring the 

American colonies in rebellion. This affront angered the Americans 

the more. 



158 


WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 


tinental Armies, and, in the wisest act of all, chose George 
Washington, of Virginia, to fill the office. 

255. George Washington.— While one reason for choosing 
Washington was that he was a Southerner, and choosing him 



George Washington 

After a painting made by Peale in 1772. It shows Washington in the uniform 

of a British colonial colonel. 

would bind the South to New England’s fortunes, there were 
better reasons. The new commander must not only lead the 
soldiers but he must gain the love and devotion of the whole 
people. This Washington was fitted to do. He had already 









159 


WAR BEGINS IN NEW ENGLAND 

won renown as a leader in the French and Indian War. His 
stalwart figure and his composed and dignified manner awed 
men, but gave them confidence in him. A resolutely closed 
mouth and a firm chin told of his perfect moral and physical 
courage. When he believed in a course, he followed it—single- 
minded, just, firm, and patient to the end. For him defeat 
was only a reason for exertion. For such a struggle as was 
before America, fortune could not have sent a more perfect 
leader. He won men’s hearts from the very first by the 
modest way in which he accepted command, and by refus¬ 
ing to accept any pay for serving his country. 

256. Bunker Hill.—Before Washington was twenty miles 
on his way to Boston, he learned that a battle had been 
fought there. Learning that the Americans had behaved 
bravely, he said, “ Then the liberties of the country are 
safe.” Gradually the whole story came to him. General 
Gage had seen the “ Yankees ” building a fort on Breed’s 
Hill, 1 overlooking Boston, and fearful lest they should fire 
down on Boston, making it hot even for “ redcoats,” had 
decided to drive them away. He saw Colonel Prescott on 
the earthworks and asked a Loyalist if that man could fight. 
“ Yes, to the last drop of his blood,” was the reply. The 
British troops were ordered to the attack (June 17th, 1775). 

The line of red-coated Englishmen came steadily up the 
hill, its quiet, orderly advance watched by the provincials 
behind the earthworks. “ Don’t fire,” went the word along 
the American lines, “ till you can see the whites of their 
eyes.” Then the volley was poured into the brave red line. 
Twice the British came steadily up the hill and fell back only 
to leave behind them windrows of dead and wounded com¬ 
rades, mowed down by the deadly “ Yankee ” fire. But 
the British tried again, and when the line came the third 
time, it pushed on over the earthworks, where the desperate 

1 Bunker Hill had at first been selected, and though there was a 
change to Breed’s Hill, the battle became known as the Battle of 
Bunker Hill. 



160 


WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 


minutemen, whose powder was gone, fought with clubs and 
stones and the butts of their muskets. The Patriots re¬ 
treated with some loss, and the British had won; but all that 
night the chaises and chariots that went to the Boston 
wharves to bring home the British dead and wounded filed 
slowly through the streets of Boston. A few more hills 
bought at that price would ruin the British cause. 

257. British and American Chances of Winning.—It now 
dawned upon the British that it was not so foolish of the 
Americans to fight as it might seem. True, the British Isles 
had five times as many people, and the British Government 
had a great standing army, a great navy, and vast military 
stores, while America had almost nothing in readiness. But, 
on the other hand, to transport troops and all their equipment 
three thousand miles would cost England much. Moreover, 
few as the Americans were—about two and one half millions 
—many could shoot with deadly accuracy. The backwoods¬ 
men, farmers, and hunters had tough sinews and unyielding 
courage. • Then, too, the Americans would fight, as a rule, on 
the defensive, in a rough country, whose hills and bridgeless 
rivers and tangled wilderness they knew better than the 
British. The war would be “ an ugly job,” England’s great¬ 
est general declared. 

258. Boston Captured.—When Washington reached his 
army, he found it disorganized, lacking in guns and powder, 
wanting in discipline, and torn by jealousies among the of¬ 
ficers. Everybody wanted to be first. Washington rebuked 
one fault-finder, saying that “every post ought to be deemed 
honorable in which a man can serve his country.” Gradu¬ 
ally the mob was drilled into an army. 

By springtime Washington was ready for action. March 
4, 1776, he seized Dorchester Heights, which overlooked Bos¬ 
ton from the south as Breed’s Hill did from the north. “ Re¬ 
doubts were raised.” wrote a British officer, “as if bv the 
genii belonging to Aladdin's wonderful lamp/’ General 
Howe, who had supplanted Gage, did not care to repeat the 


INDEPENDENCE AND CONFEDERATION 161 


Bunker Hill experience, so he hurriedly embarked his army 
with nine hundred frightened Loyalists and sailed away to 
Nova Scotia. 

259. Montgomery and Arnold Fail to Take Quebec.— 

America would have been wild with joy but for news that had 
lately come of the failure of an attack on Canada. Richard 
Montgomery, with two thousand men, had gone by the way 
of Lake Champlain against Montreal. He took that city and 
then advanced down the St. Lawrence to attack Quebec, the 
citadel of British power in Canada. To aid him, the brave 
Benedict Arnold, with eleven hundred men, had made a terri¬ 
ble march 1 through the Maine forests, and arrived at Quebec 
with half his original army. In a blinding snowstorm, De¬ 
cember 31, 1775, the two leaders made the attack, but brav¬ 
ery was in vain—Montgomery was killed, Arnold wounded, 
and Quebec lost. During the rest of the winter and the 
spring Arnold retreated step by step, all of the dreary way 
out of Canada, and in June stood at bay near Lake Cham¬ 
plain. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: (Washington) Lodge and Roosevelt, Hero Tales from 
American History. Collins, A History of Vermont. Fiske, American 
Revolution, I. Coffin, Boys of ’7Vi, 17-81. 

Sources: Hart, American History Told by Contemporaries, II, Nos. 
191, 192, 170, 171, 166-169. 

Fiction: Hawthorne, Grandfather’s Chair, 239-272. 


CHAPTER XIX 

INDEPENDENCE AND CONFEDERATION 

260. Growth of Bitterness Against England.—Until about 
the time of the capture of Boston, Americans had hoped that 
the king would grant them their rights, and that the colonists 
would go on living as loyal subjects of the “good King 

1 They had nearly died of starvation, and were often glad to dig 
roots in the forest to keep life in their bodies. 




162 


WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 


George.” Independence was not seriously thought of except 
by a very few men, like Samuel Adams. Great men and good 
patriots like Washington 1 and Franklin were loath to think 
of such an outcome of the quarrel. But with every battle 
men’s anger against the British ministry grew. The king’s 
efforts to restore order in America only caused the rebellion 
to spread more widely. Besides declaring the colonists reb¬ 
els, George III hired German soldiers to fight them. In 
addition to these offenses one of his ship captains burned 
Falmouth, a Maine town. 

231. “Tom” Paine Attacks Kingship and Dependence.—• 

Americans were held back from the idea of seceding or sepa¬ 
rating from the British Empire by their old habit of thinking 
that a king ruled by divine right, by their belief that the Brit¬ 
ish constitution was the freest in the world, and by their love 
of “ Old England,” the early home of many and, at least, the 
home of their forefathers. Now there appeared early in 1776 
a most remarkable pamphlet by Thomas Paine, an English¬ 
man who had but just come from England. 2 He saw what 
held men back, and in living phrases, that made even the 
dullest men think, he ridiculed the divine right of kings. They 
were chosen at first, he wrote, because of a “ ruffianly preemi¬ 
nence.” A king is only a “ sceptered savage,” a “ royal 
brute.” How absurd is their hereditary descent! Do we 
choose an hereditary wise man or poet, he asked. Govern¬ 
ment is a necessary evil, he cried. Why have the worst 
form—a king ? Then Paine pointed out how absurd it was 
to have a continent governed by an island, and said Heaven 
meant America to be free from England, because it had 
placed the countries so far apart. With such arguments, 
some of which seem curious enough now, he aroused all 
America to look with favor on independence. 

1 Washington said that even when he took command of the army, he 
abhorred the idea of independence. 

2 It was called "Common Sense.” He found Americans, he said, 
ready to be "led by a thread and governed by a reed.” 




INDEPENDENCE AND CONFEDERATION 


163 


262. Steps Toward Independence.—John and Samuel 
Adams, meanwhile, were working hard in Congress to get that 
body to declare independence as its object. They made prog¬ 
ress to that end by getting Congress to advise (1) disarm¬ 
ing of the Loyalists; (2) opening the American ports to all 
nations except England; and (3) that new governments be 
set up in the several colonies to keep order now that the royal 
governors had fled. Against the final step of declaring in¬ 
dependence the delegates from the middle states 1 set their 
faces, because the people of that region were slow to embrace 
the idea. One by one, however, the states instructed their 
delegates to favor independence. 2 Finally, on June 7th, 
Richard Henry Lee proposed a resolution to that end. This 
was bitterly opposed by some very able men, but after three 
weeks 1 delay Congress resolved, July 2, 1776, “ that these 
United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and inde¬ 
pendent states. 11 John Adams wrote joyously to his wife, 
“ The second day of July, 1776, will be the most memorable 
in the history of America. It ought to be solemnized with 
pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports, guns, bells, 
bonfires, and illuminations from this time forward forever. 11 

263. Declaration of Independence.—The reason we cele¬ 
brate the fourth instead of the second of July is that most 
men thought more about the day Congress voted to accept 
a declaration 3 drawn up by Thomas Jefferson 4 explaining 
to the world the reasons for resolving upon independence. 
Jefferson felt keenly the American grievances, and his mind 
was full of the American ideas about government. He wrote 

1 New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, and Maryland. 

2 Those already in favor waited for the others, because, as Franklin is 
reported to have said, “We must all hang together or we shall all hang 
separately.” 

3 The Declaration was not signed (except by the President cf Con¬ 
gress, Hancock, and the Secretary, Thomson) until August 2, 1776, 
and one member did not sign until 1781. 

4 Franklin, Adams, and Jefferson had been chosen to draw this up, 
but Jefferson did the work. 




164 


WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 


clearly and in living, harmonious phrases, what all freedom- 
loving Americans believed—“ that all men are created equal; 
that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalien¬ 
able rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pur¬ 
suit of happiness. That to secure these rights governments 
are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the 
consent of the governed.” But the English Government had 
not heeded these great principles, 1 and therefore, the Decla- 


(X Z)frfZ jZ. £/lWIT£>D • 

OF AMERICA 

'li/fwn. c/rv Coust-VL. /j Jt bt+rru* Tv oc^z-Xyn , 1„. ^ 

Tjhrm tt Ct 


art-e-y 


'JusnnJL. 


■ (j i e v — / - 

/A r r\aXu/)-<* *1/ ~r\cckjsrZ. V tycrf) /^t^rrv t <X. cL&*cji/r& TZJJxxjfc 

fca. *rjyisl^L<rry*a T’rwv'jv^Jn*) -YCJfyAisrtd djuJb*sr*_. C<U(^W 

The Declaration of Independence 
Facsimile of the first paragraph in Jefferson’s handwriting. 


ration asserted, it was right for America to free herself from 
that government and to set up a new one. 

264. The Danger of Independence.—Among the Whigs, 
or Patriots, the news was joyfully received. Some thought¬ 
less people went too far and did foolish things, like burning an 
effigy of the king or burning his portrait in a public square. 
In New York City the American soldiers pulled down a 
leaden statue of George III and melted it into bullets. 
Many, however, saw the matter more seriously, and trem¬ 
bled at the thought of separation from Great Britain. The 
Tories—especially those who were not merely pensioners of 
the king but true lovers of their country—feared that if 
America freed herself, “ that unfortunate land would be 


1 A list of twenty-seven grievances was given: see the text of the 
Declaration in the Appendix to this book. 












INDEPENDENCE AND CONFEDERATION 165 

the scene of bloody discord and desolation for ages.” They 
thought that only England’s power kept the colonies from 
fighting one another, each for its own interests. But for 
a time the colonies all worked together, did the will of Con¬ 
gress, and tried to make a plan of confederation which would 
keep them always united in defending America against the 
rest of the world. They were a long while in agreeing upon a 



Independence Hall in the Time of the Revolution 
From a contemporary drawing. 


plan of union, but meanwhile each state created a new gov¬ 
ernment and a constitution to regulate it. 

265. John Adams Urges New State Governments.—This 
making of governments by the people was a new thing in the 
world’s history. To get free from England was a hard task, 
but to free America from European modes of government and 
set up a rule by the people would be one of the grandest 
achievements in human history. The man who had the most 
ideas as to the way these new governments should be formed 
was John Adams. His work in these days won him the hon¬ 
orable title of the 11 Statesman of the American Revolution.” 
Though not an orator, he was a great debater, for he per- 























166 


WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 


fectly understood what he wanted, and with undaunted firm¬ 
ness forced men to his views. 

266. The People Make Their Own Governments.—Some 
colonies had temporary governments, and Connecticut and 
Rhode Island decided to get along with their old colonial 
charters, modified a little; but nine of the new states made 
new constitutions, which have been the models for all Ameri¬ 
can constitutions since that time. The people, as John 
Adams said, “ erected the whole building with their own 
hands.” The work was done by a convention, a body of 
men chosen for the purpose. When the new, written consti¬ 
tution was made for the state, the government was in all re¬ 
spects supposed to be bound by it. 

267. Bills of Rights. — The government, Americans 
thought, was only the servant of the people, who had the real 
power. Therefore, it was customary to put a “ bill of 
rights,” or scattered clauses having the same purpose, in 
each constitution. This bill was a statement of things which 
the government could not do; it was, in other words, a list of 
the rights of man, which could not be taken away, such as 
freedom of speech, right to worship whom and how one 
chose, and right to trial by jury. 1 Englishmen had wrung 
most of these rights, one by one, from unwilling kings, but 
Americans looked upon themselves as the rulers, and they 
withheld their rights from any interference by their ser¬ 
vant, the government. 

268. The Kind of Government.—The main object of the 
other parts of the constitutions was to describe the form of 
government, largely an imitation of the old colonial charters 
or the English form of government. Each constitution pro¬ 
vided for a legislature, a governor, and judges. In all but 
two states the legislature was to have an upper and a lower 
house. In fixing the mode of electing legislators and gov- 


1 Look up the bill of rights in your state constitution. Nearly every 
state has such a bill. 




INDEPENDENCE AND CONFEDERATION 167 

ernors, the constitution makers were not so democratic as we 
have since become, for they allowed only property owners or 
taxpayers to vote, while in some of the states only property 
owners and men who held certain religious ideas could hold 
office. Men were to be allowed to hold office only for short 
terms of one or two years, lest they become tyrants and forget 
to feel as the people felt. 

269. Articles of Confederation.—While the states were 
thus making their new governments, their delegates in the 
Continental Congress were trying to agree upon some plan of 
alliance, some league of friendship, which would help Amer¬ 
ica to stand firm among the nations of the world. There 
were so many jealousies that, at times, the delegates were 
ready to give up in despair; but after nearly a year and a 
half their plan, “ The Articles of Confederation/’ was ready 
(1777). Then the state legislatures had each to approve 
it, and over three years passed before every state had ap¬ 
proved. When it was finally accepted, it provided for so 
poor a union and so weak a central government that it was 
doomed to fail. It provided that: (1) the states were to be 
sovereign, free, and independent; (2) each state was to have 
one vote in Congress; (3) taxes were to be divided among the 
several states according to the value of land in each, but Con¬ 
gress could only ask for the money, and not collect it from the 
people; (4) Congress could direct war and make peace. 

The real power was left with the states, and Congress could 
only ask them “ please ” to do this or that. As long as the 
war lasted Congress had some power, because it was to the 
interest of each state to obey in order to get free from Great 
Britain. How necessary united efforts were, we shall see as 
we turn now to study the course of the war itself, which had 
gone on while the politicians were solving the problems we 
have just considered. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: Van Tyne, American Revolution, 61-87, 136-156, 198- 
202. Fiske, American Revolution, I, 191-197. 


168 


WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 


Sources: Hart, Source Booh, 147-149. Hart, American History 
Told by Contemporaries, II, Nos. 186, 187, 188, 189. Hart, Source 
Readers, No. II, 172-180. 


CHAPTER XX 

CAMPAIGNS ENDING IN BURGOYNE’S SURRENDER 

270. The British Attack and Are Repulsed in the South.—* 

All the work of making new state governments and the Arti¬ 
cles of Confederation would go for nothing if America failed 
to defeat the British armies. The first important news that 
reached Washington after Howe sailed away from Boston 
was that a British fleet, carrying an army commanded by 
General Clinton, had appeared off the coast of North Caro¬ 
lina, and then, June, 1776, had gone on to attack Charleston. 
Washington sent to South Carolina’s aid General Lee, a 
showy, vainglorious man, who had been a soldier since boy¬ 
hood, who had fought against the Turks, and who seemed a 
great hero to his uncritical contemporaries. He only 
found fault and made trouble, however, and Charleston 
was saved by General Moultrie, who succeeded in driving off 
the whole British force. 1 

271. British Plan to Sever Colonies at the Hudson River. 

•—Soon after Howe abandoned Boston, Washington left there 
to go to New York, for he rightly guessed that the next main 
attack would be upon New York City. England’s plan was 
to cut the chain of thirteen colonies by holding the line of the 
Hudson River. New England seemed to lead the rebellion, 

1 The sand bars off the harbor compelled ships to sail by the end of 
Sullivan’s Island, and there Moultrie built a fort of sand and palmetto 
logs. Lee sneered at this home-made fort, but cannon balls fell harm¬ 
less upon it, and though the British fleet sailed boldly in, the ships were 
so riddled by shot from the fort that their commanders were glad to 
order retreat. Meanwhile Clinton had landed 2,000 men on a sand 
bank, but, while vainly trying to wade ashore, they were driven nearly 
wild by mosquitoes, and they were glad to escape and sail away. Later 
the whole expedition joined General Howe. 




CAMPAIGNS ENDING IN BURGOYNE’S SURRENDER 169 


and if it could be cut off from the other colonies, resistance 
might soon die out there. Washington hurried to New York 
and fortified the city. He need not have hurried, for Howe 
did not appear until earty in July, when with fair wind and 
rapid tide his ships sailed up the narrows between Staten 
Island and Long Island, setting the city in an uproar. Alarm 
guns were fired, and everything was in the “ height of bustle.” 

272. Battle of Long Island and Washington’s Escape.—It 
was the end of August before Howe began his campaign. 
Then he landed on Long Island to drive the Americans from 
their forts on Brooklyn Heights. He skillfully cut in two the 
American army that came to meet him, and it appeared as if 
the whole American army would be surrounded and taken. 
But fortunately the night was stormy and the next morn¬ 
ing was foggy and Washington got some Massachusetts fish¬ 
ermen to row the American army back to New York (August, 
1776). A few shots at the rear guard was the only consola¬ 
tion the outwitted British could get. Washington with¬ 
drew from New York City, where he might have been penned 
up, and never again did he let Howe put him in so tight 
a place. It was at this time that Captain Nathan Hale of 
Connecticut was hanged by the British for spying on their 
camp. In noble words in the shadow of the gallows he 
regretted that he had only one life to give for his country. 

273. Arnold Prevents British Coming Down the Hudson.— 

Howe now hoped to hear of the success of Carleton, who 
was to come from Canada by way of Lake Champlain and 
meet Howe coming up the Hudson. When the two armies 
should join, the colonies would be severed as the British 
had planned. But the fierce energy and courage of Bene¬ 
dict Arnold saved America from this terrible blow. To 
meet Carleton’s overpowering fleet on Lake Champlain, 
Arnold built out of the standing timber of the forest a little 
fleet with which he gave the British seven hours of desperate 
fighting. Then in the mists of the night, sailing or rowing 
as he could, Arnold escaped to Ticonderoga. Carleton re- 


170 WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 

turned to Canada. This battle not only prevented Carleton 
from joining Howe, but, as we shall see, delayed the next 
year’s campaign, and thus saved the American cause from 
possible disaster. 

274. Washington’s Retreat Across New Jersey.—Mean¬ 
while Washington retreated up the Hudson. He checked the 

British in a battle at White Plains, 
but when they captured Fort Wash¬ 
ington, he saw that there was no 
hope of his regaining any ground 
near New York. Defeat disheart¬ 
ened the American soldiers, and 
they went off, Washington wrote, 
“ almost by whole regiments, by 
half ones, and by companies at a 
time.” Step by step the dwindling 
army retreated, first across the Hud¬ 
son and then through New Jersey, 
until at last a little band of only 
3,000 men stood with their devoted 
chief on the bank of the Delaware. 
Seizing every boat for miles up and 
down the river, Washington got his 
army across to Pennsylvania just as 
Howe’s advance guard arrived on 
the Jersey shore. Then came the 
news that General Charles Lee, who 
had traitorously refused to bring his 
part of the army to Washington’s aid, 1 had been captured 
by the British. Because of Lee’s experience as a soldier in 
Europe, this seemed another terrible loss, but was really good 
fortune, since we now know that he was a traitor. Every 
prospect was dark. Philadelphia seemed about to fall into 
British hands, and Congress, after giving Washington sole 
direction of the war, fled to Baltimore. 



Washington’s Uniform 
Now in the National 
Museum, Washington. 


1 Lee had been left east of the Hudson to guard the Highlands. 





CAMPAIGNS ENDING IN BURGOYNE’S SURRENDER 171 

275. British Think War is Over. —Lord Howe thought 
\\ ashington’s army was worn out. Leaving Cornwallis with 
the troops, he went back to New York to enjoy Christmas, 
and hear men call him Caesar, who came and saw and con¬ 
quered. But Washington would not give up. With 
bounties and promises he had raised his army to 6,000 men, 
and undaunted by past defeat, he planned to cross the 
Delaware into New Jersey and surprise the British at 
Trenton. 

276. The “ Old Fox ” Defeats the British.—Only the part 
uf the army which Washington led succeeded in crossing. 
The raging snowstorm and the river filled with ice dismayed 
the others. The snow changed to sleet and rain, but the lit¬ 
tle army marched nine miles and entered Trenton pellmell, 
surprising the Hessian garrison 1 and throwing them into the 
utmost confusion. “ The hurry, fright, and confusion of the 
enemy,” said a witness, “ was not unlike that which it will 
be when the last trump shall sound.” With a thousand 
prisoners the Patriots recrossed the river, and then crossed 
back again into New Jersey. Cornwallis started out from 
Princeton to “ bag the old fox,” as he called Washington, but, 
instead, the “ old fox” doubled and near Princeton bagged 
three of Cornwallis’ own regiments. 2 Within a short time 
a large part of New Jersey was retaken from the British. 
But the most important result of the action was the renewed 
courage given to America. The statesmen of Europe began 
to believe that America would succeed. British scorn, too, 
was changed to a wholesome respect. 


1 These were the German soldiers whose hiring by George III had so 
enraged the Americans. 

2 Washington was at this time greatly aided in keeping his little army 
together by Robert Morris. The soldiers had had no pay, the time of 
their enlistment had expired, and they threatened to go home. Wash¬ 
ington wrote Morris of the state of affairs, and the rich patriot raised 
the money among his friends to keep the army together. His great 
service deserves to be forever remembered. 



172 


WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 



277. The Brit¬ 
ish Plan to Con¬ 
quer America.— 

The rest of the 
winter was 
passed by Wash¬ 
ington at Morris¬ 
town, which was 
so near New 
York that he 
could be ready 
for any move of 
the British there. 
During the win¬ 
ter the British 
ministry in Lon¬ 
don again made 
their plans with 
the old purpose 
of cutting the 
colonies in two 
along the Hud¬ 
son. Three ar¬ 
mies were to 
meet at Albany 
—one setting out 
from Oswego on 
Lake Ontario 
was to come 
down the Mo¬ 
hawk, another 
from Canada 
was to go up 
Lake Cham¬ 
plain, cross the 
watershed, and 
















CAMPAIGNS ENDING IN BURGOYNE’S SURRENDER 173 

come down the upper Hudson, and Lord Howe was to come 
up from New York to Albany. To succeed in meeting as 
was planned, the three armies must work in harmony, but 
the two armies from Canada had to move through an almost 
trackless wilderness, where no human being could foresee 
the obstructions or tell how far an army could march in a 
given time. Moreover, the orders for the three armies were 
to go out from London and through carelessness Howe’s 
orders were never sent. He should have known enough to 
go to Albany, but he did not. 

278. Beginning of Burgoyne’s Campaign.—General Bur- 
goynewas given command of the British army 1 which was 
to come by the Champlain route. At first he was alarmingly 
successful. He took Ticonderoga and then advanced upon 
Fort Edward, but General Philip Schuyler, a skillful general, 
who had Washington’s confidence, caused trees to be felled 
across his road and much delayed his march. Slowest of all 
came the supply wagons, and Burgoyne became so fearful of 
starvation that he sent a motley force of one thousand Ger¬ 
mans, British, and Indians to seize some stores at Benning¬ 
ton. But the New England farmers gathered under John 
Stark, encircled the force and captured it after two hours’ 
fighting. Then the New England militia, fired with the idea 
of capturing Burgoyne’s whole army, came flocking in and 
began to hang like a gathering storm upon Burgoyne’s left. 

279. St. Leger Repulsed on the Mohawk.—Burgoyne now 
hoped that the army under General St. Leger, which was to 
come down the Mohawk, might come to his aid. But 
St. Leger was having trouble of his own. In a swamp near 
Oriskany some of St. Leger’s Tories and Indians had am¬ 
buscaded a Patriot army under General Herkimer, but 
after a fierce struggle with knife, hatchet, and bayonet, 
unrivaled in its savage horror, the Indians fled. St. Leger 
still had strength, with his Tories, however, to besigr: 
Fort Stanwix; but Benedict Arnold coming up irom xne 


1 About 9,000 men, who started about June 1, 1777. 




174 


WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 


Mohawk Valley to the rescue, caused the British army to 
be so terrified by a false report of the size of his army that 
it broke up and fled. What had become of the complacent 
and leisurely Howe? 

280. Philadelphia Takes Howe.—Common sense ought to 
have told Howe to go north to meet Burgoyne, but the idea 
of capturing the “ rebel capital,” as he called Philadelphia, 
lured him southward. Washington stood in his way, so he 
set out by sea, and, curiously enough, went all the way around 
to Chesapeake Bay, and up to Elkton. 1 Thence he marched 
across country, and having beaten the Americans badly at 
Brandywine Creek 2 (September, 1777), he captured Phila¬ 
delphia in spite of Washington, who had come down from 
the north to resist Howe’s progress. It really didn’t matter 
much, for Congress simply loaded its papers on a wagon and 
went off to sit at Lancaster. Franklin jokingly said that 
Philadelphia had taken Howe. Washington, however, tried 
to drive the British out, and attacked part of the ene¬ 
my’s army early one morning in Germantown, just out of 
Philadelphia. A dense fog spoiled the American plan, and 
again Washington’s army was beaten. Nevertheless, Wash¬ 
ington had kept Howe so busy that he could not go to Bur¬ 
goyne or send him aid, and that was more important than 
winning a battle. 

281. Burgoyne Surrenders.—At the north, meanwhile, 

Burgoyne’s situation grew more desperate each day. Con¬ 
gress almost saved him at the last moment by putting the 
incapable General Gates in the place of General Schuyler, 3 
but, as it proved, the Americans won in spite of Gates. Sev¬ 
eral battles took place, the British fighting desperately, 
while the Americans, under the leadership of Arnold, 4 were 

1 This lost him nearly a month’s time. See map on p. 172. 

2 Howe had 18,000 to Washington’s 11,000 men. 

3 Schuyler’s enemies had made false representations to Congress. 

4 Gates would not lead the men. and Arnold, though an under officer 
and without Gates’ approval, did so. 



THE FRENCH ALLIANCE AND WESTERN CONQUEST 175 

courageous and obstinate. Burgoyne saw that he could 
not go on. He began his retreat, but was surrounded near 
Saratoga. He there surrendered 6,000 men, all that was left 
of his army; for, besides his losses in battle, the Germans had 
deserted “ in shoals ” to the Americans. 

282. Effect of the Battle of Saratoga.—The effect of this 
surrender was immense; the line of the Hudson was saved, 
the British plan of war was spoiled, and the king was so im¬ 
pressed with the military success of America that he con¬ 
sented to send three peace commissioners, who offered the 
Americans peace and anything they wanted except inde¬ 
pendence. Neither Congress nor the states, however, would 
listen to the offers of the men sent by the king to tempt 
America. The rebellion that had at first been a pygmy had 
now become a giant. 


Suggested Readings 

Histories: Todd, In Olde New Yorke. Harper, Decisive Battles of 
America (ed. Hitchcock) . Fiske, American Revolution, I. Van Tyne, 
American Revolution, 157-174. Wilson, Life of Washington. ( Prince¬ 
ton and Trenton) Lodge, Life of Washington. Brooks, Century 
Books of the American Revolution. Creasy, Fifteen Decisive Battles. 
Scudder, Life of Washington. Drake, Burgoyne’s Invasion. Wister, 
Seven Ages of Washington. Baldwin, Four Great Americans. Frost, 
Heroes of the Revolution. Southworth, Builders of our Country, II. 

Sources: Hart, Source Readers, No. II. Hart, American History 
Told by Contemporaries, II, Nos. 193-198. 


CHAPTER XXI 

THE FRENCH ALLIANCE AND WESTERN CONQUEST 

283. French Reasons for Helping America.—That France 
should join America in a war upon England had seemed 
probable from the first. England and France had long been 
enemies. Many bitter wars had been fought between them 
but none more bitter than that for the ownership of America, 
which was decided in England’s favor when Wolfe captured 


176 


WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 


Quebec. From that hour French statesmen watched for a 
time when England should be weakened and when France 
might avenge her shame and regain her power. Besides, 
many of the French people had a generous enthusiasm foi 

the “freedom loving Americans.” 

284. Secret Aid from the French.—Hardly was the revolt 
of the English colonies begun when the French Government, 

urged on by Beaumarchais, a play¬ 
wright and a lover of America, be¬ 
gan to furnish America with secret 
aid. Everything that America 
most needed was sent—gunpowder, 
shot and shell, clothing, and mus¬ 
kets for thousands of men. Some 
Frenchmen came to fight. Most 
famous and helpful of them all was 
the noble young Lafayette, who at 
his own expense fitted out his own 
ship and came to America to help 
her win independence. The greatest 
need, however, was the aid of the 
French navy, for as long as England 
controlled the sea, she could not be 
wholly beaten. But a navy cannot 
be secretly lent, so Congress determined to make every effort 
to draw France into an open alliance. To this end Benjamin 
Franklin was sent to France. Braving the terrors of a wintry 
sea, this man, seventy years of age, crossed the Atlantic in 
a small ship, and December 18, 1776, arrived in Paris. 

285. Franklin’s Diplomacy and the Treaty with France.— 
Franklin’s appearance in France was greeted with the great¬ 
est enthusiasm. Everybody knew about him. From the 
nobles and philosophers to the meanest peasant or the scul¬ 
lion in the kitchen, all had heard of the discoverer of electric¬ 
ity in the clouds, the writer of “Poor Richard’s Almanac,” and 
all thought him a friend to human kind. He appeared as an 





FRENCH ALLIANCE AND WESTERN CONQUEST 177 

apostle of liberty from the land already famed for its freedom. 
Paris lost its head over him. He was crowned with laurels 
and he grew weary of sitting for busts and portraits. Amid 
the lace and embroidery, the powder and the perfume of the 
French court, walked this simple farmer figure with brown 
coat, round hat, and unpowdered hair. He 
made himself agreeable to everybody, espe¬ 
cially to the king. Franklin praised the 
king for the aid he had given, but urged 
him to go further. At last, when the news 
came of Burgoyne’s defeat, the king con¬ 
sented, and a treaty was drawn up (Feb¬ 
ruary, 1778) in which France agreed to a 
military and political alliance with the 
United States. 1 

286. The Winter at Valley Forge.—This 
encouragement was needed, for the winter 
just past had been a dark time for lovers of 
America. After the battle of Germantown, 

Washington had retired for the winter to 
Valley Forge. There his soldiers suffered 
every want. Shivering with cold and stain¬ 
ing the snow with their bloody feet, they re¬ 
mained steadfast with their leader throughout the bitter 
winter. Nearly 3,000 of Washington’s men were unfit for 
duty because they were barefoot, and some were even naked. 
Horses starved to death and men yoked to wagons brought 
some relief to starving comrades, who lay in huts or wig¬ 
wams of twisted boughs. At evening the cry would go 
up from the soldiers, “No meat, no meat.” Yet, “naked 
and starving as they are,” wrote Washington, “we cannot 
enough admire the incomparable patience and fidelity of the 
soldiers.” He marveled that they had not mutinied. Some, 
indeed, deserted, but it was little wonder, for, as a Tory 



A Soldier of 
Congress 
From a drawing 
made by an offi¬ 
cer during the 
war. 


1 This was the only treaty of alliance ever made by the United States. 







178 • WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 

wrote, in Washington’s camp the soldier had thirteen kings 1 
and no bread, and it seemed better to serve one king and 
have plenty of bread. 

287. The Conway Cabal. —-Nothing but the devoted and 
patient spirit of Washington kept the army together. Yet 
this man who held all others to the task did not please 
every one. He retreated too much, it was said, and he failed 
when Gates, “the hero of Saratoga,” succeeded. Some dis¬ 
contented men, led by a disgruntled general named Conway, 
put their heads together to overthrow Washington and put 
the weak and talentless Gates in his place. Washington’s 
manliness and frankness uncovered the whole plot, and the 
“ Conway Cabal ” fell to pieces. A lesser man than Wash¬ 
ington would have resigned and let things go to the dogs, but 
he had a faithfulness that could not be driven from its task by 
jealousy or resentment. It is this trait that gives him a 
unique and solitary place among the world’s heroes. 

288. Steuben Drills the American Soldiers. —Some good 
came out of this terrible winter at Valley Forge, however, 
for there Baron Steuben, a brave German, who had been a 
soldier under Frederick the Great, earned his title of “ drill- 
master of the American Revolution.” He could not make 
the Patriots braver soldiers, but he could teach them the use 
of their weapons. Hitherto they had either left their bayo¬ 
nets at home or used them to toast beefsteak—if they had 
any—but Steuben drilled them until they could make a 
bayonet charge equal to that of the best British soldiers. 

289. British Retreat from Philadelphia. —While Washing¬ 
ton’s army was passing such a wretched winter at Valley 
Forge, the British army in Philadelphia, not a day’s journey 
distant, lived in luxury and passed a merry winter. But by 
spring the British had discovered that there was nothing to 
be gained by holding the “ rebel capital,” and Sir Henry 
Clinton, who had been sent to take Howe’s place, evacuated 


1 Referring to the thirteen states. 




FRENCH ALLIANCE AND WESTERN CONQUEST 179 

the city. His army began the march across New Jersey 
toward New York. Washington was after him at once, and 
at Monmouth made an attack which might have crushed 
Clinton but for the treachery and cowardice of General 
Lee. 1 Steuben’s well-trained soldiers saved the day by a fine 
bayonet charge, but the battle was a drawn one, and the Brit¬ 
ish army marched safely on to New York. Thus ended the 
British campaign for the control of the middle states. Howe 
had chased Washington out of New York, but Washington 
had chased Clinton back in, and the struggle ended where it 
began. 

299. British and Tories Try to “Wear Out” the Ameri¬ 
cans.—Now that the great plan of the British for conquer¬ 
ing America and capturing the “ rebel ” army had failed, 
their war methods degenerated into an effort to wear out 
the Americans by raids, by attacks on their frontiers, and 
by burning their seaports. Much of that work was done 
by Loyalist fugitives from the revolted colonies, who either 
formed “Tory” bands of their own or joined the regular 
British army. 

291. Raids on the Frontier.—It greatly embittered the 
hate of the Patriots for the Loyalists that they took part in 
two fearful massacres of frontier settlers. Into the beautiful 
Wyoming Valley in northeastern Pennsylvania swept a mur¬ 
derous band of Indians, led by a Tory ranger, Colonel John 
Butler (1778). They burned and slew and tortured until the 
name of the lovely valley to this day suggests surpassing 
horror. Cherry Valley in central New York was likewise 

devastated. This aroused Congress to send General Sulli¬ 
van, who defeated the Tory forces at Newtown, though they 
returned and carried on their reign of terror until the war 
closed. In the far west the British commander at Detroit 
urged the Indians in his neighborhood to make raids on the 


1 He had been received back from the British by exchange. 




180 


WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 


settlements lately made in Kentucky. 1 That we may bet¬ 
ter understand the nature of these settlements and the In¬ 
dian hatred of them we must take up the story of the English 



A Pioneer Train. 

colonists’ movement across the mountains, where we left it 
while speaking of the causes of the French and Indian War. 

292. The Westward Movement Through the Alleghanies. 
—We have seen how Virginia had been the first to push west¬ 
ward along the pathways that Nature had made. The trail 
of the deer and the bison to the salt lick became first the trail 
of the hunter, then the path of the fur trader, and at last the 
rough road over which the pioneer, moving westward to the 
vacant back lands, toiled with rude wagons and ever-ready 
rifle. Scotch-Irishmen and Germans from Pennsylvania, 
pushing westward for fertile and vacant lands, had en- 


1 Colonel Hamilton, the British commander, was known as the 
“hair-buying general” because, it was said, he paid the Indians for 
scalps. 







FRENCH ALLIANCE AND WESTERN CONQUEST 181 

tered the trough of the Great Valley between the Blue Ridge 
and the Alleghanies, and following the path of least resist¬ 
ance, had turned southward, settling the Shenandoah Valley 
and the plateau lands of western North and South Carolina. 
By 1768 they had passed from the valleys of rivers flowing 
oceanward to the upper valleys of rivers flowing westward 
into the Tennessee and Mississippi. 

293. Boone and Robertson.—before the first battle of the 
Revolution was fought, the famous hunter Daniel Boone had 
ventured into “the country of Kentucke,” while James Rob¬ 
ertson and his neighbors from North Carolina had begun a 
settlement of the fertile lands on the Watauga, now in Ten¬ 
nessee. A little later Boone led the hardy pioneers to a 
beautiful region, now known as the “Blue Grass ” country in 
Kentucky. As the Indians had made hunting grounds of 
Kentucky and Tennessee, there were no Indian towns, and 
besides, the fertility and pleasing climate and numerous salt 
springs 1 tempted the home-seeking pioneer. Both the Ken¬ 
tucky and Tennessee settlements grew rapidly, a great wedge, 
so to speak, driven into the Indian country. Just as Captain 
John Smith and his fellows in Virginia, and the Pilgrims in 
New England, had made the entering wedge for English civ¬ 
ilization on the Atlantic coast of America, so Boone and Rob¬ 
ertson and their fellows began the English settlement of the 
Mississippi Valley, which is now the home of so large a part 
of the American people. 

294. Indian Attacks on the Western Settlers.—The Indi¬ 
ans saw with unrest the coming of the farming pioneer; he 
came not for a day, like the fur trader, but to build his home 
and to stay. Enraged by the invading pioneers, the South¬ 
ern Indians rose first and attacked the Watauga settlement 
which had just begun in that region, but James Robertson 
and John Sevier defeated and cowed them (1776). In the 


1 Such springs were very necessary as a source of salt after men left 
the seaside, the principal source of salt in early days. 




182 


WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 


next year there came from north of the Ohio raid after raid 
upon the Kentucky settlements. The Indians were urged 
on, as we have seen, by the British commander at Detroit. 
The terrors of savage warfare drove many of the Kentuck¬ 
ians from their rude cabins and log forts until only a few hun¬ 
dred remained. Of these the greatest was George Rogers 
Clark, a daring hunter and a born leader of men. He saw 
that the British influenced the Indians through the French 
who still remained in the fur-trading posts of the Northwest, 
especially at Kaskaskia and Vincennes. 1 Securing a com¬ 
mission and money from the Governor of Virginia, Patrick 

Henry, he got together 
a band of sturdy fight¬ 
ers, and set out to take 
the French towns and to 
save the West. 

295. George Rogers 
Clark.— The little force 
floated down the Ohio in 
flatboats, and from near 
its mouth marched to 
Kaskaskia. Surprising 
the place, they easily 
took it, thus securing 
the respect of the Indians of that region, who called Clark 
the “Big Knife Chief.” Hearing that Colonel Hamilton 
with Tories and Indians was holding Vincennes, 2 Clark 
started overland to take it. It was a terrible march over bog 
and flooded lowlands. Sometimes the men were neck deep 
in icy water; they had to camp on a hillock in drizzling 
rain and shiver without food or fire until morning. Yet they 

1 The first on the Mississippi and the second on the Wabash. 

2 The French inhabitants had raised the American flag under 
persuasion from a messenger of Clark’s. As to this journey, read 
Churchill’s charming story “The Crossing.” The account in Roose¬ 
velt’s “Winning of the West” is fascinating. 













FRENCH ALLIANCE AND WESTERN CONQUEST 183 

wallowed on, breaking the thin ice of streams, and keeping up 
courage by song and threat and jibe. At last the town came 
in sight. By a ruse, Clark deceived the enemy as to the 
size of his force, and Colonel Hamilton surrendered, Febru¬ 
ary, 1779. Clark’s bravery was rewarded when, in the treaty 
of peace (1782), all of this rich land was ceded to the United 
States. 

296. Stony Point and “Mad Anthony” Wayne.—While 
these events were happening in the West, the British in New 
York, aided by Loyalist refugees, were continuing the war of 
desolation and making marauding expeditions. Almost the 
only attempt at a regular campaign was the taking of Stony 
Point, upon the Hudson, June, 1779, as if to try again to 
split the colonies along that line. A month later “ Mad 
Anthony ” Wayne retook this fort from the British by a val¬ 
iant bayonet charge at midnight. 

297. Persecution of the Loyalists.—All of the marauding 
raids, which were the chief features of the war in 1778 and 
1779, were laid to Tory hate, and the Whigs, resolving to 
have an eye for an eye, increased their persecutions. Tories 
who had fled to the British had become spies, and some had 
conducted relentless warfare against their former fellow 
countrymen. The Loyalists who remained at home among 
the Patriots were fined, imprisoned, and banished, and even 
put to death. 1 The estates of those Loyalists who had fled 
were confiscated. The many really fine men who were thus 
banished were a serious loss to America. It is from a study 
of this struggle between Whigs and Tories that we see the 
American Revolution to have been a civil war in America 
as well as a war between England and her rebellious 
colonies. 


1 Besides legal action against them, there was the mob with tar and 
feathers, which some escaped only by flight and weeks of skulking in 
the woods or swamps, only to reach the British exhausted and penniless. 





184 


WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 


Suggested Readings 

Histories: (Boone, Sevier, Clark) McMurry, Pioneers of the Missis¬ 
sippi Valley. Lodge and Roosevelt, Eero Tales from American His¬ 
tory. More, Benjamin Franklin. Ford, The Many Sided Franklin. 
Baldwin, Four Great Americans. (Franklin) Williams, Some Suc¬ 
cessful Americans. Fisk e, American Revolution, II. Van Tyne, Amer¬ 
ican Revolution. Roosevelt, Winning of the West, II, 1-12, 08-84. 
Wilsonj Life of Washington. Stepping Stones of American History. 

Sources: Hart, American History Told by Contemporaries, II, 
Nos. 199, 201. Hart, Source Readers, No. II. 


CHAPTER XXII 
THE END OF THE WAR 

298. The French Alliance.—After the signing of the French 

treaty, France gave money openly to Congress, but for a time 
did not aid much with the army she sent to America. How¬ 
ever, she persuaded Spain to help her fight their old enemy, 
and by attacks on England and the West Indies kept the 
British busy. She helped, too, in fitting out American ships. 

299. Paul Jones and America’s Navy.—The war had scarce 
begun when Congress felt the need of a navy to enable Amer¬ 
ica to cope with England, whose navy was the most powerful 
in the world. But for privateers 1 with “ letters of marque 
and reprisal” 2 from Congress or the states, America would 
have made a sorry figure on the seas. After the alliance, 
France aided some of the boldest of our American seamen 
with ships and money, that they might do some real damage 
to English commerce. The most famous American so aided 
was Captain John Paul Jones, who with the ship Ranger had 
spread terror among the British seaports. In 1779 the French 
Government fitted him out with five vessels, his flagship being 
the Bon Homme Richard. With crews made up of men from a 
dozen nations, many of whom feared nothing and nobody but 

1 Privately owned vessels fitted out to prey on the enemy’s commerce. 

2 Without these letters the seamen could be seized and hanged as 
pirates if they captured the ships of another nation. 



THE END OF THE WAR 185 ‘ 



the daring Paul Jones, he preyed on the British coasts, until 
his name became a terror to English seamen. 

300. Battle Between 


the Serapis and the 
Bon Homme Richard. 

— Off Flamborough 
Head the Richard 
came upon the Sera - 
pis, an English frig¬ 
ate. They closed in 
one of the bloodiest 
naval fights of history, 
Jones even lashing the 
British vessel to his 
flagship that there 
might be no escape. 
Both ships were afire, 
the Richard filling with 
water and the decks 
covered with dead and 
dying, 1 when the Brit¬ 
ish captain surren¬ 
dered. The defeat 
was a severe blow to 
a proud nation that 
claimed to “ rule the 
waves.” All the world 


talked of the heroic 
Paul Jones, and then 
began America’s rise 
as a sea power. 

301. Dark Days in America.—It was well that America 
had this cheering news, because, for a time thereafter, her 


Portrait of Paul Jones 
Drawn from life by '* the Citizen Renaud,” 
and published as the frontispiece of rare 
French memoirs of Jones. 


1 The British captain, it is said, asked Jones, whose ship seemed to be 
sinking, whether he had struck his flag. “I haven’t yet begun to fight/’ 
Jones answered. 
















































186 


WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 


outlook grew steadily blacker. The winter of 1779-80 was 
one of suffering for the American army. The situation 
was “ the most distressing of any since the beginning of the 
war/’ wrote Washington in January, 1780. “ For a fort¬ 

night past the troops, both officers and men, have been perish¬ 
ing for want. They have been alternately without bread or 
meat the whole time ”—sometimes without either. There 
was everywhere a weariness of war. 

302. The Evils of Paper Money.—It was little wonder men 
were tired of war, for many who were least able were suffering 



The Paper Money of Congress. 


because of the state of money matters. With an army and 
navy and post office and ambassadors to be supported, Con¬ 
gress did what the colonies had long been in the habit of doing 
—issued paper money. Why tax when the printer could 
turn out bushels of money ? Such magic did not work after a 
few months, for people doubted whether Congress could ever 
redeem the paper. Merchants could change prices, and so 



THE END OE THE WAR 


187 



Continental Coins. 


they charged more to make up for the lower value of the 
money. Prices began to look absurd. Samuel Adams, who 
always was poor, could 
now wear a suit and 
hat worth $2,000, and 
his tea cost him $90 
per pound—in paper 
money. Congress tried 
to rid itself of the mill¬ 
stone of paper money 
by getting loans from 

France, loans from the American people, and finally asked 
the states to send flour, hay, and pork to the army, as if 
to a donation party. All schemes failed and paper money 
became a joke. Men talked of papering houses with it. 

303. Arnold’s Treason.—When the gloom over these mat¬ 
ters was at its worst, came the heartbreaking news that the 
brilliant General Arnold had become a traitor. His bravery 
and energy in the American cause seemed to him to have 

been ignored by Congress, 
and his patriotism gave way 
at last to offers from the 
British of a rich reward if 
he would betray an impor¬ 
tant fort on the Hudson. 
Washington trusted Arnold 
perfectly, and at his re¬ 
quest gave him command 
at West Point. The British 
sent Major Anclre to ar¬ 
range secretly with Arnold 
the plan of surrender, but Andre was captured while return¬ 
ing, and his papers exposed the whole plot. Arnold escaped 
to the British, but the young and spirited Andre, who like 
Nathan Hale had risked all for his country’s cause, met the 
same fate as the American patriot and was hanged as a spy 



The House at Tappan in which 
Andre was Imprisoned. 















188 


WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 


(October 2, 1780). Washington was in despair. "Whom 
can we trust now?” he cried, when he learned of Arnold’s 
treason. The misguided man not only betrayed his country, 



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Arnold’s Treason. 


but was false to his commander, who had been his friend. 
Because of that his character is, as Franklin said, “on the 
gibbet, and will hang there in chains for all ages.” 

304. War in the South.—But dark as all things were for 
America, the light was even then about to break. Two years 
















THE END OF THE WAR 


189 


before Arnold’s treason the British had turned their attention 
toward the South. King George, thinking half a loaf better 
than none, hoped to keep the southern half of his colonies at 
least. The new plan worked well at first. Savannah was 
captured by General Clinton (1778), and then Charleston 
fell (1780). Clinton then sailed back north, leaving Lord 
Cornwallis to subdue the whole State of South Carolina. 

305. Marion and Sumter.—About the only resistance 
Cornwallis met was from small bands of men led by the Pa¬ 
triot leaders, Andrew Pickens, Francis Marion, and Thomas 
Sumter. But for them, Cornwallis complained, South Car¬ 
olina would be at peace. They kept the little flame of rebel¬ 
lion burning by swooping down from the woods and moun¬ 
tain valleys in desperate attacks upon the British and their 
Loyalist allies. 

306. Gates’ Defeat.— Hearing of the brave, unaided fight 
these men were making, Congress sent Gates, the “ hero of 
Saratoga,” to help them. He gathered a small army about 
him, which was badly beaten at Camden (August 16, 1780) 
as a result of his stupidity. His own flight 1 he described 
as being “ carried far to the rear by the rush of the fleeing 
militia.” 

307. King’s Mountain.—After the battle of Camden, the 
British leader, Cornwallis, sent Colonel Ferguson to enlist 
Loyalists, who were thought to be numerous in the highlands 
of South Carolina. Soon, however, Ferguson’s band of a 
thousand men was surrounded on King’s Mountain (Oc¬ 
tober, 1780), by frontiersmen from the new settlements 
beyond the Alleghanies. The steady, ruthless advance of 
these Western Indian hunters, dodging from tree to tree 
on the mountain side, was more than Tory heart could 
stand, and when Ferguson, their leader, fell, the white flag 
was raised, and seven hundred Tories surrendered. 

308. Greene Turns the Tide—The affair at King’s Moun¬ 
tain put a little heart into the Patriots. Except for that, the 

1 He fled 200 miles in two and one half days. 






190 


WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 


year’s work had been a failure. In the spring of 1781 General 
Greene, who had been sent to take Gates’ place, gathered the 
Southern militia about him. Morgan with part of Greene’s 
command defeated the British at Cowpens. Two important 
battles were lost by Greene, one at Guilford Court House 
(March, 1781), and one at Hobkirk Hill, but in both he 
turned defeat into advantage, and by the autumn he had the 
British penned up in Charleston. Though he had lost nearly 
every battle, he had practically won the campaign. 

309. Cornwallis Pursues Lafayette.—In despair of defeat¬ 
ing Greene, Cornwallis turned toward Virginia to aid Arnold, 
now fighting on the British side, in the capture of Lafayette, 
to whom Washington had intrusted an army there. From 
the sea to the mountains and back again Cornwallis chased 
Lafayette, declaring the “boy” 1 could not escape, but yet un¬ 
able to trap him. Tired out at last, Cornwallis fortified 
Yorktown, and Lafayette settled down to watch him. 

310. British Surrender at Yorktown.—At last the moment 
had come for the French to render a great service. An army 
under Rochambeau, sent from France in 1780 to aid Wash¬ 
ington, was at Newport, R. I. A French fleet was coming up 
from the West Indies. Flere was the chance, and Washing¬ 
ton seized it. Rochambeau’s army was sent for. It joined 
Washington’s army, and the whole force marched rapidly 
southward. Hastily a British fleet w T as sent to Cornwallis’ 
aid, but already the French admiral, De Grasse, was guard¬ 
ing the entrance of Chesapeake Bay. The British fleet was 
beaten off hy the French fleet, and the united French and 
American armies when they came to Lafayette’s aid so pressed 
and bombarded Cornwallis that on October 17, 1781, he sur¬ 
rendered. His soldiers marched out and laid down their 
arms to the tune “ The World’s Turned Upside Down.” 

311. Lord North Resigns.—The messenger, who brought 
the news to Lord North that Cornwallis’ army was taken, 
says that North threw up his hands in despair. “ It’s all 


1 He was then twenty-three years old. 



THE END OF THE WAR 


191 












192 WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE 

over,” he exclaimed, and so it was. The loss of Cornwallis’ 
army alone would not have forced England to let her colonies 
go, but she now had not a friend among the European pow- 



American independence, and finally a motion, whose object 
was to end the war, was carried (February 27, 1782). Less 
than a month later Lord North resigned. The English Whig 
party now came into power, eager for peace with America. 

















THE END OF THE WAR 


193 


312. A Treaty of Peace.—The American Congress sent 
John Jay, Benjamin Franklin, and John Adams to meet the 
English peace commissioners, and after many disputes 
terms of peace were agreed upon. The treaty was signed 
at Paris in September, 1783. It provided that (1) Great 
Britain should acknowledge the independence of the United 
States; (2) the territory of the new nation was to extend 
from the Great Lakes to the thirty-first parallel of lati¬ 
tude, and from the Atlantic to the Mississippi; (3) citi¬ 
zens of the LTiited States might fish in the Nova Scotian 
and Canadian waters as they had done when British subjects. 
At the same time Spain and France ended their war with 
England; and, as Spanish soldiers had conquered Florida, 
that part of America was ceded to Spain. The British kept 
Canada and Nova Scotia. Thus Spanish territory, Florida 
and Louisiana, bounded the United States on the south and 
west; and British territory on the north and northeast. 

313. Results of the Revolution.—America was now free to 
grow naturally in her own way. She could try a government 
by the body of the people, instead of by a king, and might 
try local self-government. She could abolish legal distinc¬ 
tions between man and man, and seek to give every man an 
equal opportunity. America became a haven for the lovers 
of liberty in all countries, and the tide of migration set toward 
America as soon as the Revolution ended. As Franklin said 
during the war, “ We are fighting for the dignity and happi¬ 
ness of human nature. Glorious it is for the Americans to be 
called by Providence to this post of honor.” 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: (King’s Mountain) Lodge and Roosevelt, Tales from 
American History. Seawell, Twelve Great Naval Captains. Fiske, American 
Revolution, II. Van Tyne, American Revolution. Abbot, Paul Jones and 
Blue Jackets of '76. Brooks, True Story of Lafayette. B. F. Comfort, Arnold's 
Tempter. 

Sources: Hart, American History Told by Contemporaries, II, Nos. 216, 
214, 212, 208, 204. 



IV 

PERIOD OF THE RISE OF A STRONG GOVERN¬ 
MENT PARTY, AND OF REACTION 


CHAPTER XXIII 

HOW EUROPE INFLUENCED AMERICA (1607-1815) 

314. America and Europe.—The Americans, whose his¬ 
tory we have been studying, were closely related to the 
people of northwestern Europe. Many of them had rela¬ 
tives living in Great Britain and to a lesser extent in Ger¬ 
many, Scandinavia, Holland, France, and other countries; 
for it was from these lands beyond the sea that tney or their 
ancestors had come to live in the New World. They spoke 
the languages of Europe, read European books, received 
letters and papers from Europe, and, once in a while, visited 
the old home. They used English, Spanish, Portuguese, and 
French coins when they bought and sold their goods. In 
making laws they used the same words and phrases that 
English lawyers were familiar with. They played the old 
games, sang the old songs, told the same old stories the boys 
and girls in the Old World loved. To be sure, the Americans 
of Washington’s time had learned many new things in their 
new home, but they had also not forgotten much of the old 
life of the people of Europe. Thus the old and the new made 
the Americans what they were. It is our work in this 
chapter to see what Europe did for America while the United 
States was growing into a new and distinct nation. 

315. English Ideas of Government.—The people who made 
the United States kept just those European customs and 
ideas which suited them in their new home. If most of 
them had been of French or Spanish ancestry they might 
not have objected to being governed by men sent out by the 

195 


196 


THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 


king of the mother country. The French people of Canada 
and of Mexico—their near neighbors—were submissive to 
governors not chosen by themselves. But from Maine to 
Georgia the great majority of the inhabitants of the United 
States were, at the time we have now reached in our study 
of American history, descendants of Englishmen, and Eng¬ 
lishmen were likely to take a personal interest in their 
government and to wish some share in the choosing of their 
rulers. It is true there was a hereditary king in England, 
but his power had been greatly restricted. 

316. In 1215, Magna Carta forbade the king of England 
to levy taxes on his own account without consulting at 
least the more important of his subjects. It also forbade 
him to imprison people just as he saw fit without a trial. 
Some years later the king had to assemble the representa¬ 
tives of the people to help him make the laws and authorize 
him to collect taxes. This assembly was called the a Parlia¬ 
ment.From 1295 it was usual for English kings to summon 
Parliament quite regularly for this purpose. This gave at 
least some Englishmen the habit of voting for members of 
the national government and of criticizing the acts of public 
officials. Parliament then undertook to interfere with the 
selection of men to act as advisors to the king. From time 
to time the king signed laws limiting his authority in some 
way, and these laws were regarded as so important and fun¬ 
damental that they made up what is called the “ English 
Constitution,” that is, the established law of the land which 
was not to be changed or set aside by the mere will of one 
man. Whatever the king did must conform to the con¬ 
stitution of England. 

317. Charles I and James II tried to do things not per¬ 
mitted by the established laws of England. For this the 
first was put to death in 1649, after a civil war, and the sec¬ 
ond was driven from the country in 1688. Thus English¬ 
men had learned that the kings were under, and not above, 
the laws of the land. One of the most important of these 



HOW EUROPE INFLUENCED AMERICA 197 

laws—the Petition of Right of 1628, which further guarded 
the liberties of the English people and strengthened the 
position of Parliament—was adopted just before the great 
migration of the English people to New England, which 
lasted until 1640 and brought over the ancestors of many 
millions of the present inhabitants of the United States. 
These immigrants left England at a time when opposition 
to the government was common, and they did not forget 
their experiences with rulers who had tried to override the 
laws and set up a tyranny. Here in America these people 
were still willing to live under the government of a king so 
long as the king did not get in their way. If he offended 
them, however, they had learned back in England how a 
king could be successfully opposed, and their descendants 
never forgot this lesson. 

318. The Constitution of the United States.—How the 

English ideas of government affected our government can 
best be seen by reading our own Constitution, which dif¬ 
fers from the English constitution in that most of it is in¬ 
cluded in a single document, while the English constitution 
is made up of many laws, court decisions and customs. The 
American Constitution, like the English, forbade the making 
of laws and the levying and expenditure of taxes without the 
consent of the representatives of the people. Here, as in 
England, men must not be imprisoned or punished without 
a trial in court. King James II had tried to interfere with 
the ancient right of petition. After he had been expelled in 
1688, the famous Bill of Rights, which Parliament compelled 
his successor (William III) to accept, guaranteed the right 
of petition, and the Constitution of the United States did 
likewise a century later. If we had no king in this country, 
still we had a president and a Congress that also might wish 
to be tyrannical; and the people thought it best to do as 
their ancestors had done—to set it down where all could 
read just what the rights of the people were to be. Those 
who came to New England in Charles Us time could tell 


198 


THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 


how their friends had been cruelly punished for opposing the 
government; how men like Prynne had had their ears 
cropped, their bodies beaten, and had been compelled to 
stand for hours in the pillory. In America such treatment 
came to be regarded as barbarous; and in the new Constitu¬ 
tion a provision was placed forbidding cruel and unusual 
punishments. 

319. The Law of Treason.—In England in medieval times, 
almost any opposition to the king was called treason and 
punished with death. Before Englishmen came to America 
they had limited the meaning of treason to levying war 
against the country or in adhering to and giving comfort 
to its enemies. This was done in the reign of Edward III. 
Many years later the Americans thought it well to limit 
the definition of treason in the same manner. 1 

320. Billeting Soldiers.—The English Petition of Right 
forbade the quartering of soldiers in the homes of the people 
in times of peace. In 1790 the same provision was put into 
the Constitution of the United States. Still other examples 
could be given to show how the English constitution in¬ 
fluenced the Constitution of this country. 2 

321. Liberty in America.—But Americans did not stop 
at laying down certain rules which their government must 
follow. They believed also in liberty. By liberty they 
meant that all men should be free and enjoy the same rights. 
The opening sentences of the Declaration of Independence 
and the bills of rights found in many of the state constitu¬ 
tions made during the Revolution express this idea of liberty, 
that “all men are created free and equal,” and have equal 
rights to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” It 
was not usual for people in Europe to speak thus. Gener¬ 
ally people said that a few persons had a right to rule the 

1 Read what is said in Article III, Section III, Clause I, of the Con¬ 
stitution of the United States. 

2 Pupils should consult the first ten amendments to the Constitution 
of the United States. 



HOW EUROPE INFLUENCED AMERICA 


199 


rest, and it was the duty of the rest to obey these few rulers. 
In the free air of America it was quite natural that the idea 
of liberty should flourish, but even in Europe, especially in 
France and England, some persons had come to talk about 
liberty. In England John Locke, and in France Rousseau 
and others, had written books even before the American 
Revolution in which liberty was praised. 

These books were read in America and helped to strengthen 
an idea already familiar here. These writers found the 
words suited to express a common American belief that all 
men are free and equal by right. Rousseau wrote that no 
man had any natural right to exercise authority over other 
men, except as allowed by common consent. Governments, 
said he, are a convenience but must govern by the permission 
of those who are governed. Locke expressed essentially the 
same ideas. The American Declaration of Independence 
restated these principles of liberty with startling effect. It 
seems indeed that the American idea of liberty owes some¬ 
thing to the advanced thinkers of France and of England, 
for the books of these writers were read in this country even 
before the war for independence. 1 

322. The Eighteenth Century.—When the eighteenth cen¬ 
tury began, governments outside of England were repressive 
and arbitrary. A reaction set in all over Europe during 
the period that followed. A group of brilliant writers in 
France, including such men as Voltaire, Diderot, and Rous¬ 
seau, argued that the world would be better off if govern¬ 
ments would become more liberal; and the rulers of even 
such countries as Prussia, Austria, and Russia talked in 
somewhat the same way and some of them made some 
attempt to put their ideas into effect. In England, Adam 
Smith urged in his great book, “The Wealth of Nations,” 
published in 1776, a more liberal policy as to trade and com- 

1 Pupils should read the opening paragraphs of the Declaration of 
Independence. 




200 


THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 


merce. In Italy, Beccaria argued that governments ought 
to be more lenient in punishing breaches of the law. 1 It was 
in France and America, however, where liberal ideas had the 
greatest effect, leading to a revolution and an actual change 
in the governments in both countries. America acted first, 
but Frenchmen were keenly interested in our success and, 
in 1789, followed our example. 

323. Religion.—Early in the sixteenth century, a Ger¬ 
man monk named Martin Luther led a revolt against the 
authority of the Pope in matters of religion. In 1529 his 
followers came to be called “ Protestants.” Other oppo- 
nents'of the church appeared in France, Switzerland, England, 
and other countries. The revolt spread into Scandinavia 
and Scotland, where most of the people became Protestants. 
Henry VIII, mainly for personal reasons, substituted the 
authority of himself and his successors for that of the Pope, 
within his dominions. He retained much of the ceremony 
of the Catholic church, together with bishops as rulers of the 
church next to himself. In Switzerland, John Calvin taught 
that the church should be governed by the ministers and 
representatives of the church members meeting in assem¬ 
blies. This idea became popular in Scotland under the 
vigorous preaching of John Knox. The church there came 
to be called “Presbyterian/’ because of the important part 
played by the presbyteries, or meetings of ministers and 
elders, in its government. North Germany and the coun¬ 
tries of Scandinavia became mostly Lutheran, while the 
Protestants of Switzerland, France, England, and Scotland 
were mostly Calvinists. The Dutch were either Lutheran 
or Calvinist. This was the situation by the year 1600. 

324. Religious Sects in England.—In England the estab¬ 
lished church lost in time some of its members. Some 

1 Beccaria wrote thus: “Such punishments, therefore, and such a 
mode of inflicting them, ought to be chosen as will make strongest and 
most lasting impressions on the minds of others with the least torment 
to the body of the criminal.” 



HOW EUROPE INFLUENCED AMERICA 


201 


became Presbyterians. Others, called Brownists, Separa¬ 
tists, Independents, or Congregationalists, objected to a cen¬ 
tral authority over the church. They wished instead that 
each church congregation should be self-governing. Later 
still, the Methodists objected to the lack of spiritual fervor 
and to the mere formality which they thought characterized 
the English established church. Under the preaching of John 
Wesley, they started an independent church of their own. 
Baptists and Unitarians were also found in England. There 
were Quakers in England, Mennonites and Moravians in 
Germany and Austria, and a few followers of Emanuel 
Swedenborg. All these sects had come into existence before 
America separated from England, and immigrants from 
Europe had brought them hither where they are still found 
in a more or less flourishing condition. The Calvinists are 
especially important since they included most of the aggres¬ 
sive and influential people of New England, where the Calvin- 
istic idea of church government administered by the people 
themselves or their representatives took strong root. This 
plan which worked so well in the church, as they thought, 
also was applied to the state. It fostered the democratic 
ideal of government. It fitted well with the town-meeting. 
In Virginia, the Episcopal church, organized like the estab¬ 
lished church of England, fitted well with the centralized 
government of the province. 

325. Religious Toleration.—Wherever in Europe any of 
these sects or churches obtained the upper hand, it was 
likely to make life uncomfortable for all who disagreed with 
it. Soon religious dissensions promoted emigration to 
America, whither men came in the hope of being permitted 
to worship as they saw fit. In this country, however, no one 
denomination had enough members in comparison with the 
others to permit it to have a favored position: and so we find 
the new Constitution of the United States saying that Con¬ 
gress must make no laws respecting an establishment of 
religion or interfering with the free exercise thereof. 


202 


THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 


326. The United States and Foreign Countries.—When a 

new country appears amid the “ family of nations/’ its in¬ 
dependence and equality must be recognized by at least 
some of the older governments in order that it may re¬ 
ceive the consideration to which it thinks itself entitled. 
France had extended such recognition to the United States 
in 1778 and England in 1783. Other countries followed. 
From this time on our relations with foreign countries were 
regulated, not according to the laws of England, but accord¬ 
ing to those rules, customs, and treaties which make what we 
call “international law.” Ministers and consuls were sent 
and received by us. These ministers made treaties with the 
approval of the government which they represented and they 
were the means by which the governments communicated 
with each other; for it is contrary to good international cus¬ 
tom for kings and presidents to write directly to each other 
except on very rare occasions. The consuls reported on 
trade and business conditions, and interested themselves in 
the welfare of citizens of their own country who came their 
way, and who might need their assistance. They were in gen¬ 
eral the business agents of the governments which sent them 
forth. Soon American ministers and consuls began to arrive 
in Europe, looking after our interests there, while the repre¬ 
sentatives of European governments began to appear here 
for a similar purpose. When we had to protest to England 
against her failure to fulfill the Treaty of 1783, or to Spain 
against her closure of the Mississippi to American commerce, 
it was one of these officials who presented our grievances to 
the offending government. Treaties were entered into with 
foreign countries, some of which are still in force. 

327. The Family of Nations in 1783.—In your study of 
the geography of the world as it is today, the names of many 
countries now familiar to you do not mean just what they 
meant in 1783 when the United States became a nation 
among the nations. The German Empire and the Kingdom 
of Italy did not exist. If our government had to make a 


HOW EUROPE INFLUENCED AMERICA 203 

treaty with a German government, as it did in 1799 and 
1828, it must be made with Prussia or one of the smaller 
German states which were joined together in 1871 to form 
the German Empire of the present. Once we dealt with the 
little kingdom of Sardinia, where we now deal with Italy of 
which Sardinia is a part. In Washington’s time, Turkey 
included all the land now comprised within the Balkan 
states and some beyond them, together with the northern 
countries of Africa along the south shore of the Mediterranean 
Sea. Finland then belonged to Sweden, while Russia’s pos¬ 
sessions in Asia were much less extensive than they now are. 
Belgium then belonged to Austria and was known as the 
“Austrian Netherlands.” Although American ships some¬ 
times made their way to China and Japan, these countries 
were hardly within the range of American interests except 
where commerce was concerned. 

328. Sources of Immigration. —England, with Scotland 
to the north and Ireland and Wales to the west, made up 
what, since 1707, had been called Great Britain. Ireland 
contained two unlike and often hostile peoples—the Protes¬ 
tant Scotch-Irish of Ulster in the north, and the Celtic Irish, 
mostly Catholics, in the remainder of the island. All parts 
of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, as it 
was called, contributed something to the population of the 
United States. It was mainly from the eastern counties of 
England that the early settlers of New England came before 
1640. It was from Ulster in Ireland that many Scotch-Irish 
came to the western counties of Pennsylvania, Virginia, and 
the Carolinas, settling in the “great valley” between the 
mountains in the days before the American Revolution. The 
Scotch furnished many sturdy emigrants to the eastern 
American colonies and also such explorers and traders a? 
Mackenzie, who penetrated to the remotest parts of the 
continent in search of wealth and knowledge. 

329. French and German Settlers. —From France came 
hither Protestant Huguenots. They were driven from their 


204 


THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 


native land by the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, which 
had hitherto allowed them to remain there unmolested. But 
in 1685, Louis XIV withdrew this toleration. These Hugue¬ 
nots were intelligent and industrious, so they added a valu¬ 
able element to our population. Early in the eighteenth 
century many Germans emigrated from the Palatinate, which 
is the upper Rhine country of Western Germany. They set¬ 
tled mostly in Pennsylvania, and to some extent in other 
colonies. Their homeland had been harried by contending 
armies in the wars of Louis XIV. From Austria came 
Moravians to settle in Georgia and elsewhere. They brought 
a sober, peace-loving, farming population to the land which 
now received them. 

330. Relations with Great Britain.—The majority of 
Americans were of British origin. Great Britain held Can¬ 
ada to the north and important islands, like Jamaica and 
Barbados, in the Caribbean Sea, with which we had impor¬ 
tant business relations and other affairs to settle as between 
neighbors. With Canada there were boundary disputes and 
fishing rights to adjust. Thus it was that our foreign rela¬ 
tions were more largely with the British government than 
with other countries. 

331. France.—France had been our ally in the war for 
independence. We felt so closely attached to her that what¬ 
ever affected France in her relations with other governments 
was quite likely to interest us. This became especially true 
when France and England went to war in 1793. We then 
found ourselves interested spectators of a strife between the 
land which had been our mother country and the land which 
had been our best friend in time of need. 

332. Spain.—Spain had possession of the western half of 
the vast Mississippi valley and the mouth of that great river 
which reached into the heart of the continent. In Mexico, 
Central America, and South America, Spain ruled countries 
which were sure to interest us some day because they are 
our neighbors and commercially important to us. Spain 


HOW EUROPE INFLUENCED AMERICA 205 

was also closely connected with our old ally and friend—■ 
France. 

333. The West Indies.—Although the West Indies were 
close to the United States and of great commercial impor¬ 
tance to this country, they were owned by several of the 
great maritime nations of western Europe. England held 
Jamaica, Barbados, and numerous lesser islands. To France 
belonged Martinique and Guadaloupe, while Spain owned 
Cuba and Porto Rico. San Domingo island was partly 
French and partly Spanish and was going to see many revo¬ 
lutions and become an independent but turbulent repub¬ 
lic. Of these islands sugar and molasses were the principal 
products. The islands were greatly prized by the countries 
which owned them. They usually prohibited all trade ex¬ 
cept with themselves. The planters must import slaves, 
lumber, fish, livestock, and grain. The nearest source for 
these was in North America; but England, after our war for 
independence, forbade Americans to trade with her West 
Indian possessions. When war broke out with France in 
1793, England tried to prevent our trade with the French 
West Indies also. She seized many American ships and 
sailors who ventured into those parts. 

334. Spanish America.—Except Brazil, Spain owned all 
the land from Cape Horn in South America, to the sources 
of the Mississippi River and to Puget Sound in North Amer¬ 
ica. Her right to some of this was disputed. She had never 
settled all of it. The king of Spain was the source of all 
authority over this vast region. He was assisted in its gov¬ 
ernment by two councils in Spain. One of these councils 
dealt with trade and the other with civil affairs. Four vice¬ 
roys governed for him in the New World. There was a 
viceroy for Mexico, which included all the country north of 
Panama. In northern South America was the viceroyalty of 
New Granada; to the southward, that of Peru; and in south¬ 
ern South America, that of Buenos Ayres. These viceroyal¬ 
ties were divided into still smaller areas, each under a cap- 


206 


THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 


tain-general. The people, as in Spain, had no voice in their 
government, except sometimes in local affairs. They were 
either Spaniards, Indians, or negroes, or various combina¬ 
tions of these races. They were mostly poor, ignorant, and 
without ambition. Taxes were high and collected in a very 
vexatious manner. The king of Spain took one-fifth of the 
gold and silver obtained from the mines. A few men, know¬ 
ing what had been done by France and the United States to 
obtain freedom, soon began a revolt against Spanish rule. 
This revolt before many years resulted in the creation of the 
independent republics of Mexico, Central America, and South 
America. Spain, once the greatest power in Europe and 
America, was soon to lose all her colonial possessions except 
a few islands in the Caribbean Sea and the Philippines; and, 
by the end of the next century, was to lose these also. 

335. Monarchy in Europe and Democracy in America.— 
All the European countries we have mentioned were ruled 
by kings, the people having no voice in the government, 
except in England. Switzerland and Holland had republi¬ 
can forms of government; but their role in international 
affairs was not very important. The United States was try¬ 
ing to show these monarchies how a government could be 
set up and conducted by the people themselves. It cannot 
be said that Europe had generally a very favorable notion 
of the example we sought to give them of a true democracy 
in which the people ruled. Americans, on the contrary, 
gloried in their new freedom and welcomed all who wished 
to come here to enjoy it. European governments were not 
anxious thus to add to our population of democrats by losing 
their own subjects, who were then not nearly so numerous as 
they are now. 

336. The French Revolution.—In the same year that 
Washington became first president of the United States, the 
people of France also tried to change their government so 
that the king, nobility, and church should have less power 
and the people of France more rights. This was the begin- 


HOW EUROPE INFLUENCED AMERICA 


207 


ning of the great French Revolution which profoundly 
changed the lives of many people in Europe and even in¬ 
fluenced the United States. 

337. The Government of France Before 1789.—France 
had been ruled by a king whose word was law. The king 
raised taxes and spent the money just as he pleased. He 
made war, inflicted punishments, and granted favors accord¬ 
ing to his own will. The kings were usually men of small 
ability. Public money was wasted and the country derived 
little benefit from the heavy taxes which the poorer people 
of France were obliged to pay. The nobility and the clergy 
had most of the privileges, such as exemption from taxation. 
Frenchmen who knew how the Americans had become a free 
people wished that France might enjoy some of the same 
freedom. Quite a number of them had been in America dur¬ 
ing the recent war with England and spoke in high terms of 
conditions here. Such writers as Rousseau and others 
already mentioned taught' them that liberty—more liberty— 
was better for France. 

338. The Estates-General Summoned.—France had a sort 
of parliament, called the “Estates-General,” which was in¬ 
tended to help the king in the government of the country, 
especially in the raising of money. This Estates-General had 
not been called together since 1614. At last, when the pub¬ 
lic debt was so large that payment seemed impossible and it 
was also quite impossible to borrow more money or tax the 
people more heavily, the king’s advisors suggested that the 
Estates-General be again summoned to see what they could 
do to help the king in his financial difficulties. They met in 
Versailles just as the new government of the United States 
was getting to work. 

339. The Wars of the French Revolution.—Finding that 
they could not agree with the king, the majority of the 
members of the Estates-General assumed control of the 
government and, under the name of the National Assembly, 
greatly changed the laws of the country. France became in 


208 


THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 


many ways a free country. If things had stopped here, all 
might have been well. But foreign powers suspected that the 
revolution would spread outside of France. Indeed, French 
orators said that France must make all Europe free like 
themselves. The Queen of France—Marie Antoinette— 
was sister of the Emperor of Austria. So Austria took the 
lead in opposition to the French revolution. Austria was 
joined by Prussia; and in 1792 war broke out in Europe. 
England joined the enemies of France the next year, for 
Englishmen were greatly shocked by the execution of the 
French king (1793). England also feared that France in¬ 
tended to annex the Netherlands, which then included Bel¬ 
gium whose independence England has long insisted upon. 
Gradually, other countries were involved in this struggle. 
It became a great world war in which many rival interests 
and jealousies played their part. 

340. The Reign of Terror.—At first the revolution m 
France was conducted peacefully and without bloodshed. 
The famous Declaration of the Rights of Man was adopted. 
It resembles the Declaration of Independence of the United 
States. The old privileges and abuses had been quietly 
abolished. But when war came, fear and anger led to the 
commission of many crimes in the name of liberty. All sus¬ 
pected enemies of the republic were arrested and put to 
death with little show of a trial. Dr. Guillotin contrived a 
machine which quickly and easily removed the heads of 
suspected aristocrats and worked a sure cure for disloyalty 
to the revolution. Some Americans thought that the exam¬ 
ple of France might well be followed in this country and 
eagerly adopted the manners of the French Jacobins who 
were conducting this “reign of terror.” But Americans were 
not ready for such extreme measures; and even the French 
tired of them. Ruthless terrorists, like Robespierre, were 
finally put down and more reasonable methods were followed. 
But, although France had suffered much, the country came 
forth from this ordeal a more powerful and freer country. 


HOW EUROPE INFLUENCED AMERICA 209 

341. Changes in the Government of France.—The king 
was put to death in 1793. France had already become a 
republic. In 1795 the executive power in the government 
w r as placed in the hands of the “ Directory” of five men, and 
with this Directory we had some very unpleasant experiences 
later. All this time the war was going on. The most suc¬ 
cessful of the French generals was a young Corsican named 
Napoleon Bonaparte, who whipped the Austrians soundly in 
Italy and then went to fight in Egypt, where things did not 
go so well with him. Nor had matters gone well for French 
armies while Napoleon was away and, as Napoleon’s disasters 
in Egypt were not appreciated in France, people came to 
regard Napoleon as a genius who, if he were in full control, 
could make the armies of France invincible. So, when 
Napoleon returned from Egypt, he had himself put in control 
of affairs in place of the Directory. Under the title of First 
Consul he waged successful wars until peace came in 1801 
and 1802. In recognition of his achievements Napoleon was 
made emperor in 1804. He again began a series of even more 
successful wars against Austria, Prussia, and Russia. 

342. England, France, and the United States.—During 
this tremendous world war France’s most persistent enemy 
was England, whose most dangerous weapon was her navy. 
Since the days of Oliver Cromwell, one hundred and fifty 
years before, England’s sea power had been increasing. Her 
ships were larger and more numerous. The British and 
French fleets had often met in combat. There had been 
fights at sea to match those on land when the two countries 
were battling for the mastery in India and America. The 
French were not unworthy antagonists and, in the war for 
American independence, the French fleet made final victory 
possible. But at last, in a great fight off Cape Trafalgar in 
Spain, French sea power went down to defeat before the 
English squadron under Nelson. This was in November, 
1805. From this date England used her advantage at sea 
to bring about the downfall of Napoleon. Her method was 


210 


THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 


the blockade. As a trading nation the United States did 
not like blockades. France wished to use our large merchant 
marine to import goods which England wished to keep from 
her, if brought in French ships. In 1856, the principal 
European powers adopted a rule in the so-called “ Declara¬ 
tion of Paris/’ which requires that blockades must be effec¬ 
tive. This means that blockades must be made effective 
by actually preventing the approach of merchant vessels to 
a hostile port by the use of a sufficient number of warships 
on guard for that purpose. 1 But at the time we are now 
considering, no such rule of blockade existed and, although 
England’s sea power was great, she was unable to guard 
effectively all the coasts of France and her allies and inde¬ 
pendencies. However, if an English frigate came up with 
and searched an American merchant ship, and concluded 
that the American vessel was headed for a hostile port, the 
American ship might be detained and even seized with its 
cargo. Such seizures occurred, much to the anger of the 
Americans. How this helped to involve us in the great 
European war will be seen later on. In all such wars it is 
the desire of the United States to remain on good terms with 
both sides and to trade with them so far as this is possible. 
But, although we had a large number of merchant vessels 
during this period of the Napoleonic wars, our naval growth 
was not equally extensive. Thus it was not possible for the 
government of the United States to enforce a neutral policy 
and its rights of trade as effectively as the commercial classes 
in our population desired. 

343. End of the Period.—By 1815 Napoleon was a pris¬ 
oner in the hands of the English after his defeat in the great 
Battle of Waterloo, June 18, 1815. The great world war 
then ended, and with it ended for a century our disputes 
with France and England over the freedom of the seas. 

1 The United States did not sign the Declaration of Paris, because it 
did not go so far as we wished in some particulars; but we have always 
accepted its rules in practice. 



THE MAKING OF THE CONSTITUTION 211 

For many years thereafter there was little to make our re¬ 
lations with Europe important. 

After 1815, Americans turned their energies to developing 
the great opportunities all around them. They then gave 
little thought to the affairs of the Old World. 

CHAPTER XXIV 

DISORDER TEACHES ITS LESSON OF DANGER.—THE 
CONSTITUTION IS FRAMED AND ADOPTED 

344, The New Problem of Peace.—To win independence 
from England had been the task of eight long and weary 
years of war. But when the treaty was signed, the young 
nation faced new troubles and fresh problems. The states 
that had once been colonics, fearing their inability to fight 
the war to a finish except in union, had entered into “ a firm 
league of friendship/’ and had formed Articles of Confedera¬ 
tion. But it was a serious question whether, after the pres¬ 
sure of war was removed, the states would really live in 
friendliness. If the war was to bring its best results, men 
must be ready to obey reasonable laws, and the states 
must help their common interests by doing faithfully what 
was rightfully expected of them. The debt rolled up by the 
war must be paid, and Americans must give to the world an 
example of a free people living in peace and honesty and 
striving good-naturedly for prosperity. 

345. Weakness of Congress.—By the Articles of Confeder¬ 
ation a number of important duties were given to Congress, 
which was made up of delegates sent from the states. Each 
state had as much power in Congress as had any other, and it 
required nine states to pass laws or resolutions concerning 
many of the most important matters. The delegates looked 
often only to the interests of their own states, and it was hard 
to secure agreement. Moreover, Congress had been given 
no power to compel obedience if a state or the people re¬ 
fused to do as Congress wanted them to do. It was early 


212 


THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 


seen by men like Washington that such a form of government 
—if we can call it a government—could not last long. 

346. Money is Badly Needed.— In a short time Congress 
was in sore straits for money. The states turned a deaf ear 
to the clamor of Congress for relief. Robert Morris, who had 
done valiant service in raising money during the Revolution, 
was for a time Superintendent of Finance. His reports on 
the condition of the Treasury were pitiful. He declared that 
he had no desire to remain a “ minister of injustice,” and 
soon he resigned (1784). After Morris left office, things 
were, if possible, in a worse condition than before. Money 
had been borrowed in Europe to carry on the war, and the 
interest on this debt had to be met; but Congress received 
scarcely sufficient money to pay the running expenses of the 
government, even when it was doing little or nothing. 

347. Men Refuse to Add to the Powers of Congress.— 
Congress tried to get the states so to amend the Articles of 
Confederation that it could with its own officers collect 
customs duties on goods imported from abroad. But the 
attempt failed. The states, having heretofore collected all 
revenues, disliked to yield an} r power to Congress. What 
was the use of fighting in the Revolution, thought many a 
simple-minded man, if we are now to be taxed by a body 
like Congress? Why not have left the power in Parliament 
and be done with it? He ought to have said: What was the 
use of fighting, if, when the war is over, men are to refuse 
to do their duty, pay their debts, and obey a government 
which is trying to guard their interests and their country's 
good name? 

348. Troubles with Foreign Nations.— Congress was 
much troubled by questions that arose with foreign nations. 
For England, saying that America had not honorably carried 
out the treaty of peace, refused to give up, on the north¬ 
ern frontier, a line of forts running from Lake Champlain 
to Mackinaw. Spain did not like the United States, and 
she refused to admit our claim to a large portion of the 


THE MAKING OF THE CONSTITUTION 


213 


Southwest or to suffer the Western settlers freely to navigate 
the Mississippi to the Gulf. But most trying of all was the 
fact that the Barbary pirates of northern Africa, learning 
that America was no longer protected by English gunboats, 
seized our seamen and held them in captivity, demanding a 
ransom quite beyond the slender purse of Congress. It was 
plain that the Congress of the Confederation needed to have 
the power, not only to raise money, but to compel obedience, 
and to support the dignity of a strong nation. 

349. The States Suspect One Another.—To make matters 
worse and more threatening, the states appeared daily to be 
more suspicious of one another. They did not know one 
another very well, and ignorance is often a fertile soil for 
dislike. To the New Englander the men of the Southern 
plantations appeared strange beings, and the men of the 
South could not see that the interests of the trading 
“ Yankees ” were their interests too. 

350. Congress Needs Power to Regulate Trade.—By the 
Articles of Confederation, Congress was not given authority 
to regulate commerce. It could not, therefore, pass a navi¬ 
gation act favoring nations that favored us, nor could it 
exclude from our harbors the ships of countries that did not 
allow us privileges. Some of the states passed laws that bore 
heavily on the trade of the neighboring states, and the con¬ 
sequence was that the states quarreled and were distrustful 
of one another. It was soon evident to the wisest men in the 
land that to some central authority must be given the right 
to regulate trade with foreign nations and from state to state. 

351. All Kinds of Money Are in Circulation.—The currency 
of the country was in a bad state. Various kinds of foreign 
coins were in circulation—Portuguese johanneses, English 
and French crowns, Spanish dollars, and many others. 1 Paper 

1 The coin most commonly used appears to have been the Spanish 
milled dollar. This was the “piece of eight,” which all readers of 
Stevenson’s “Treasure Island” will remember was the watchword of 
Captain Flint, the pirate’s parrot. 




214 


THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 


money was freely counterfeited, and hard money was so 
u clipped ” and “ sheared ” that Washington complained that 
if an end were not put to the practice a pistareen would 
be made “ into five quarters,” and a man forced to carry 
scales in his pocket to weigh every piece that was offered. 

352. Paper Money Makes Matters Worse, 1786.—The con¬ 
fusion caused by such uncertainties was bad enough, but 
conditions were made worse by demands that the states set 
their printing presses to work and print paper money. Gold 
and silver had taken wings and flown to the other side of the 
Atlantic, it was said. So seven states passed acts providing 
for paper money, and thus added to the hard times and 
confusion. Creditors wanted to be paid in gold or silver 
money that had good value everywhere, and not in paper 
money, for its value might speedily disappear as had the 
value of the paper money Congress had issued during the 
war. In some of the states, business was now badly de¬ 
ranged and even at a standstill. 1 

353. Shays’ Rebellion, 1786.—In the general uneasiness 
men began to grumble against governors and to cry out 
against courts and lawyers. They wanted to find a way to 
get on without paying debts. Discontent among the people 
on these subjects showed itself in its worst form in Massa¬ 
chusetts, where a dangerous insurrection broke out. Its 
leader was one Daniel Shays. The state troops were called 
out, and the rebellion was finally put down; but such an 
uprising filled wise men with fear for the future. “ There are 
combustibles in every state,” wrote Washington, “which a 
spark might set fire to.” Men began to wonder whether 
their newly won independence was to mean disorder and 
failure. 

1 Paper money had been issued during the Revolution and to some 
extent in colonial days. The bills of the Continental Congress came 
to be a huge joke. A barber in Philadelphia papered his shop with the 
money, and a crowd of men paraded the streets of the Quaker town ac¬ 
companied by a dog decorated from head to tail with paper dollars. 



THE MAKING OF THE CONSTITUTION 


215 


354. Western Land Claims.—While things seemed to be 
going from bad to worse in the general affairs of the Union, 
Congress managed to settle one set of difficulties admirably 
and to perform one great act. There had been for a long 
time much discussion and some unfriendly feeling about the 
ownership of the great West. 1 Six of the states—-New 
Hampshire, Rhode Island, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, 
Delaware, and Maryland—had no claim to the Western 
country, but the other states, asserting that their early 
charters gave them the title, 2 claimed lands extending to the 
Mississippi. Finally, the states claiming land north and west 
of the Ohio River surrendered their claims to the Union; and 
Congress passed an act, the Ordinance of 1787, for the govern¬ 
ment of this region, known as the “ Northwest Territory.” 

355. The Ordinance of 1787.—This was a very important 
act for many reasons. It was the basis of the system by 
which the government in the future was to manage new 
Western territory; it provided not that these Western 
communities should permanently be held as colonies, but 
that they should, in time, be formed into distinct republican 
states and become members of the Federal Union; it declared 
that there should not be slavery in this old Northwest, and 
thus dedicated the region to freedom; it announced that 
“ religion, morality, and knowledge being necessary to good 
government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the 
means of education should forever be encouraged.” When 
we consider the rapidity with which the new West was to be 
peopled, we can hardly overestimate the importance of the 


1 When, during the war, the Articles of Confederation were presented 
to the states, Maryland refused to accept them because she feared the 
large states which claimed land beyond the mountains. Three of 
these states—Connecticut, Massachusetts, and New York—finally said 
they would give up their claims, and Maryland then signed the articles. 
Virginia gave up her claims to land north of the Ohio. See map on p. 192. 

2 New York’s claim rested mainly on a treaty with the Iroquois 
Indians. 



216 THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 

fact that as early as 1787 Congress formed a territorial 
system based on wise and wholesome principles. 

356. Congress Must Have More Power.—By 1786 the con¬ 
dition of public affairs was serious. There was an apparent 
need of a strong government; some men dared speak even of 
a king. Certainly there must be some central authority to 
establish justice, promote liberty, secure domestic peace, 
and compel wrong-mind¬ 
ed men to do their duty. 

“I do not conceive we 
can exist long as a na¬ 
tion/’ said Washington^ 

“ without having lodged 
somewhere a power which 
will pervade the whole 
Union in as energetic a 
manner as the authority 
of the state governments 
extends over the several 
states.” 

357. The Annapolis 
Convention, 1786. — In 

this year of gloom a meet¬ 
ing was held in Annap¬ 
olis from which came unexpected results. The meeting was 
held to discuss the subject of navigation and commerce, but 
only five of the states sent delegates. Thinking it not worth 
while to deliberate at length, these delegates drew up a 
memorial proposing that a convention be held in Philadel¬ 
phia the next May (1787) to see if something could not be 
done to better matters and to improve the government. This 
proposition for a convention was echoed by Congress, and 
all the states save Rhode Island elected delegates to this 
national convention. 

358. The Philadelphia Convention, 1787.—The dangers of 
the times made men think and led them to send their ablest 



The Northwest Territory 
S howing the states afterwards carved 
from it. 





THE MAKING OF THE CONSTITUTION 217 

and wisest leaders to this meeting. Virginia sent, with others, 
George Washington, in whose honesty and wise strength the 
people felt confidence. His character and his influence were 
once more needed by the nation. Pennsylvania sent the aged 
Franklin to aid in establishing a sound government in the 
country for which he had already done so much. There were 
many other delegates, not so well known, but not less ear¬ 
nest: Alexander Hamilton, of New York, a young statesman 
who had entered into the revolutionary struggle before he 
had left his “ teens” and had shown remarkable ability; 
James Wilson, of Pennsylvania, an able lawyer, who had 
served his country well; John Dickinson, of Delaware, the 
“ Penman of the Revolution ”; James Madison, of Virginia, 
a young man who had made special study for the work of 
the convention. 

Madison more than anyone else drew up the plan which 
the Virginia delegates presented to the convention as a 
cure for the evils of the Confederation, and from his notes 
of the debates we get our chief knowledge of what was 
said in this famous assembly. For these reasons he has 
been given the title, not unjustly, of the “Father of the 
Constitution.” 

359. The Convention Decides to Establish a Government. 

—The convention lasted four months. Its difficulties were 
great and often appeared too great to be overcome. More 
than once it looked as if the members would go home in 
despair, willing to trust the fate of the nation to chance or 
war. It was determined at the outset to establish a govern¬ 
ment with “supreme legislative, judicial, and executive 
departments.” This meant a real government with power to 
act, and it meant, too, that any hope of patching up the 
Articles was given up at the outset. It was decided to have 
a Congress with two chambers—the House of Representa¬ 
tives and the Senate. The old Congress had really acted as 
the agent of the states; the new one was to be the govern¬ 
ment of the whole people. 


218 


THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 


360« Two Parties in the Convention.—There were two 
parties in the convention. On the one side was the so-called 
“Large State” party, who desired a government based on the 
nation at large; they advocated what was called “ propor¬ 
tional representation”—that is to say, the right of the 
people in each state to send representatives to the Congress 
of the new government in proportion to the population of the 
state. If Pennsylvania had ten times as many people as 
Delaware, why should not these people have ten times as 
many persons to represent them in the new government? 
Surely if the convention was to provide for a government 
springing directly from the people and making laws directly 
for the people, there should not be as many representatives 
from the small states as the big ones. The “Small State” 
party, however, thought differently; and feared that if each 
state were not allowed as many representatives as its 
neighbor, the big states would swallow up the little ones. 

361. The Great Compromise.— Over this question there 
was much heated discussion. The “ Small State ” party 
brought in a plan, which was only a sort of warmed-over 
Articles of Confederation, but this was rejected. Finally 
a conclusion was reached. It was the result of compromise; 
each side gave up a little. The Lower House of Congress, it 
was agreed, should be based on proportional representation— 
that is, the large states should send more members to Con¬ 
gress than the small ones. The Lower House or House 
of Representatives was given the right to originate all bills 
for raising revenue. 1 In the Senate, each state, great or 
small, was to have two members. 

362. Slavery Causes Much Discussion.—When this great 
difficulty was settled, the work of the convention went on 
more rapidly. There were, however, other serious questions. 

1 By this is meant that a bill to raise money for the support of gov¬ 
ernment must be brought first into the Lower House of Congress. The 
Upper House, the Senate, can consider and amend such bills after the 
Lower House has passed them. See Constitution, Art. I, Sec. 7, Cl. 1. 



THE MAKING OF THE CONSTITUTION 


219 


It was hard to decide how the members of the Senate should 
be chosen, how the President should be elected, and what 
power the President should have. 1 Moreover, the difference 
between the sections of the country presented difficulties. 
In all of the states save Massachusetts, negroes were held as 
slaves, but in the Middle States and in New England the 
number of slaves was not large and there was no particular 
interest in preserving or protecting slavery. In the South 
it was different, and especially in South Carolina and Georgia 
there was a desire for more slaves. Though a quarter of a 
million slaves were within the limits of Virginia, there was 
at that time, among the best men in the state, a strong feel¬ 
ing against slavery, and the Virginia delegates were very 
outspoken against the system. 2 

363. The Slavery Compromises.—If Congress were given 
power to exclude slaves, it appeared that two states would 
probably not accept the Constitution, and, on the other hand, 
if Congress were forbidden to exclude them, “ the Quakers, 
the Methodists, and many others’ 7 would object to the 
Constitution. It was, therefore, finally agreed that Congress 
should be given full authority to regulate commerce, but 
that the importation of such “ persons ” 3 * as any state shou ld 


1 The results of the convention’s work are seen in the Constitution. 
Look over the Constitution in the appendix of this book. Notice 
Art. I, Sec. 3, Cl. 1; Art. II, Sec. 1, Cls. 1, 2, 3; and Sec. 2. 

2 George Mason declared: “Slavery discourages arts and manufac¬ 
tures. The poor despise labor when performed by slaves.” He 
deplored the slave trade. He was sorry that the merchants of the 
Northeast “had from a lust of gain embarked in this nefarious traffic.” 
These words of Mason’s were a fair reproach to the merchants of New 
England, some of whom were exchanging rum for slaves on the coast 
of Africa and bringing the miserable blacks in horrible confinement 
across the Atlantic to be sold. Madison, another Virginian, objected 
strongly against allowing any words in the constitution of a free people 
which would recognize “the idea that there could be property in man.” 

3 The word slave does not appear in the Constitution. See Con¬ 

stitution, Art. I, Sec. 2, Cl. 3; Art. I, Sec. 9, Cl. 1; Art. IV, Sec. 2, Cl. 3. 



220 


THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 


think fit to admit would not be forbidden before the year 
1808. In the meantime, Congress might levy a tax not 
exceeding ten dollars “for each person” so imported. It 
was also agreed that in counting the population of a state 
to determine how many representatives it should have in 
Congress, three fifths of the slaves should be included—the 
famous “ Three-fifths Compromise.” 

364. A New Constitution.—Finally all the troublesome 
problems were solved, and a new constitution, providing 
for a national government, a government which should have 
its own officers, its own judges, its own sources of revenue, 
its own power, was ready to be turned over to the people for 
their adoption. The meetings of the convention had been 
held in secret. What would the people say when they dis¬ 
covered that their delegates, instead of mending the Articles 
—putting a few shingles on the roof, as one delegate said— 
had drawn up a new instrument and proposed the establish¬ 
ment of a national government ? It was a solemn but hopeful 
day when the delegates gathered around to sign the finished 
instrument (September 17, 1787). 1 

365. The New Government to Have Real Power.— By the 
old Confederation there was no attempt to establish a 
government with separate departments. Such authority 
as was granted was all in the hands of Congress. The Con¬ 
stitution, on the other hand, provided not only for a Con¬ 
gress to pass the laws, but for a President to enforce the 
laws, and for judges to interpret the Constitution and laws— 
to tell what they meant in case they were not plain. Certain 

1 “Whilst the last members were signing,” says Madison, “Doctor 
Franklin, looking toward the President’s chair, at the back of which a 
rising sun happened to be painted, observed to a few members near him 
that painters had found it difficult to distinguish in their art a rising 
from a setting sun. ‘I have,’ said he, ‘often and often, in the course 
of the session, and the vicissitudes of my hopes and fears as to its issue, 
looked at that behind the President without being able to tell whether 
it was rising or setting; but now, at length, I have the happiness to 
know that it is a rising and not a setting sun.’” 



THE MAKING OF THE CONSTITUTION 


221 


powers, like the power to make war and treaties, to establish 
post offices, to regulate foreign and interstate commerce, 
were given to the central government. This government 
was not to have all powers, but only the powers granted. 
Political powers were, therefore, divided between the states 
on the one hand, and the central government on the other. 1 
The new government was to have the right to compel 
people to obey, and to punish them if they did not. 

366. Bitter Discussion but Final Ratification, 1788.—The 
Constitution was turned over to the Congress of the Confed- 


XXt/itfa P X L L jX. P Greeted / 

Th c Ratification of the Conventions of nine States, fhall be fuffitient forthe ettablifli- 
ment of this Conftitution, between the States to ratifying the fame.” Art. vdi. 

, INCIPIENT MAGNI PROCEDEKE MENSES. 



From a Boston newspaper of June 26, 1788. 


eration and by Congress was submitted to the states to be 
voted on by conventions of the people. In these state conven¬ 
tions there were long and bitter struggles. Many good men 
feared that the new government, if once founded, would 
become a tyrant, and they would lose their new-found 
liberties. But finally hope prevailed over fear. Some of the 
states would not have ratified the Constitution had it not 
been agreed that, after it had taken effect, amendments 
should be added for the protection of certain cherished 


1 Let the student read Article I of the Constitution to see what 
powers are given the central government. We now call such a country 
as the United States a “federal state” to distinguish it from countries 
like France and England, where all political power is in the hands of 
one government. 




















222 


THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 


rights and liberties. 1 Before the end of 1788 the Constitu¬ 
tion was ratified in eleven states, 2 and steps were taken to 
bring the new order of things into effect. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: McMaster, History of the People of the United States, 
I, ch. 1. McLaughlin, Confederation and Constitution. Fiske, The 
Critical Period, 145-147, 222-306. Lodge, Hamilton, 68-78. Elson, 
Side Lights on American History, I, 24-53. Gay, Life of Madison, 
88-127. 

Sources: American History Leaflets, Nos. 20, 13, 42, 28. Hart, 
American History Told ly Contemporaries, III, Nos. 32, 46, 63, 
75, 58. 


CHAPTER XXV 

THE NATION WHEN WASHINGTON BECAME PRESIDENT 

367. The American People and the Task Before Them.— 

Before studying what the new government did, we must 
see what kind of a country the government was to rule. The 
population map for 1790 3 shows that nearly three fourths 
of the three million three hundred eighty thousand people 
lived within sixty miles of the sea. Beyond them to the 
west lay thousands of miles of wilderness thinly peopled 
with Indians. A few men realized that it was the destiny of 
the American people to conquer this great wild region, to 
bring out of it the furs of its wild animals, to fatten their 
cattle on its meadows, to cultivate its fertile river valleys 
and plains and its woodlands when they should be cleared. 
Towns must be built with timber from the forests, and coal 

1 See the first ten amendments to the Constitution, which are a sort 
of bill of rights. 

2 Two states did not ratify the Constitution till later—North Carolina 
in 1789, Rhode Island in 1790. 

3 In 1790 we learned for the first time how many people lived in the 
United States. The Constitution requires the government to take a 
census every ten years to decide how many representatives each state 
should have. See population map, p. 223. 



THE NATION IN WASHINGTON’S TIME 


223 


and iron and other mineral wealth dug from the earth. 
Only then could great manufacturing cities grow up and the 
arts and crafts of civilized man find foothold where once 
were only wilds. This mighty task lay before the American 
people, and as it was revealed to them, they faced it undis¬ 
mayed. Confidence in 
the future of his country 
was the most marked 
trait of the American of 
1789. 

368. Distribution of 
the People.—Over half 
the people of the United 
States lived south 
of Pennsylvania. Nine 
tenths of them all lived, 
not in cities, but in the 
country, most of the 
men working their own 
farms, raising grains 
and vegetables for their 
own use or for feeding 
the stock. A wooden 
Distribution of the Population plow, shod with iron, 
in 1790 turned the farmer’s fur¬ 

row. He sowed by hand, 
cut his grain with a scythe, and threshed with a flail, just as 
in the days of Boaz. From New England to Virginia wheat 
was the chief crop, and there was a large export trade 
in flour. Maryland and Virginia still raised tobacco, and 
South Carolina and Georgia raised rice and indigo. In 
these Southern planting states there were but two cities, 1 
Charleston and Baltimore. In the North the cities of 
Boston, New York, and Philadelphia did not have altogether 

1 Norfolk, Richmond, Wilmington, and Savannah were only small 
places. 



















224 


THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 


100,000 inhabitants. America was plainly a land of farmers, 
the large planters living in the South, the more prosperous 
small farmers living in the Middle States, and the least 
favored, because of the harsh climate and poor soil, dwelling 
in New England. 1 

369. New York a Hundred Years Ago.—It is hard for 

us to picture New York, now a great metropolis and the 
second city in the world, as it appeared to Washington when 
he went there in 1790. It had only a few thousand people 
altogether, not so many as are now crowded during business 
hours into a single block of the great city. There were then 
orchards and buckwheat fields where now are towering 
buildings. Then there was no street car; there were few 
sidewalks and almost no pavements, for New York was 
then behind the neighboring city of Philadelphia, where, 
under the wise Franklin’s guidance, the city had paved and 
lighted its streets. Things which you and I think a neces¬ 
sary part of everyday life were not then known. No one 
had ever seen an electric light or a gas light; no one had 
ever seen a train of cars, talked over a telephone, or received 
a telegram. In its magnificent harbor where now enter 
great sea-going ships that cross the ocean in less than a week, 
there was then only an occasional sailing ship; little sail¬ 
boats made what was in rough weather a dangerous passage 
to the New Jersey shore. 2 

1 The sea has been called New England’s farm, for along her whole 
shore most men depended for their living upon fishing—chiefly for cod. 

2 How strange would it have seemed to the men that gathered at 
New York to install the new government if they had been told that in 
a little over a hundred years there would be not only huge vessels pro¬ 
pelled by steam hurrying continuously across the harbor, but a tunnel 
underneath the waters, through which would speed trains of cars 
carried along by electricity, a force to them practically unknown. 
And how they would have wondered at the thought that the length 
of that rocky island would be threaded by an underground railway 
system, its cars carrying people with breathless speed underneath 
streets filled with pipes for water and gas and electric lights and tele¬ 
phones—a maze and network of iron pipes and terra-cotta conduits. 



THE NATION IN WASHINGTON’S TIME 


225 


370. Philadelphia.— In some ways Philadelphia was ahead 
of New York; but it would now look to us, could we see it 
as it then was, like a plain, demure little country village that 
had forgotten to put in the conveniences of everyday life, such 
as running water and a sewage system. “At ten o’clock 
in the evening all is quiet in the streets,” wrote a traveler 
of the time; “ the profound silence which reigns there is only 
interrupted by the voice of the watchman. . . . The 
streets are lighted by lamps, placed like those of London. 
On the side of the street are footways of brick and gutters 
constructed of brick or wood. Strong posts are placed to 
prevent carriages from passing on the footways. All the 
streets are furnished with public pumps in great numbers. 
At the door of each house are placed two benches, where the 
family sit at evening to take the fresh air and to amuse 
themselves in looking at the passengers.” 

371. Households of Rich and Poor.—There was little 
manufacturing done, for America received most of her man¬ 
ufactured goods from England. The homes of the wealthy 
people everywhere were furnished from abroad. The 
carpets, the tables, chairs, and fine old sideboards, the 
tapestries, and the silver and china came from over the sea. 
Men like Washington and Madison and Jefferson dressed in 
rich goods brought from France or England. But among the 
farmers and poorer classes all this was different. Their 
homes were often built of logs hewn in the forest. From the 
sheep on the hills came the fleece which the mother and 
daughters spun into wool, and the linen, too, was made in 
the house. Most of the household necessities, in fact, 
were made in the home. Even the things made to sell were 
largely produced at the hearthstone, in hours spared from 
farm labor, and sold to a factor or trader. 

372. Beginnings of Manufactures.—About 1790, however, 
it was plain that a change was taking place. Already the 
newly invented spinning “jenny” and frame, the mule 
spinner, and the power loom had vastly altered the methods 


226 THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 

of making woolen and cotton cloth in England. In 1790 
Samuel Slater, who had learned the art in England, set up 
spinning machines in Pawtucket, R. I., thus beginning the 
growth of cotton, woolen, and hemp mills in the United 
States. 1 

373. New England’s Industry.—In New England, espe¬ 
cially, this new industry grew, for there were many rapid 
rivers to furnish power. In an age when there was hardly 
a single steam engine in America, such water power was all 
important. Moreover, the farming in New England paid 
so poorly that many men were glad of a chance to work in a 
mill. Thus it was that this section of the country came, 
after a time, to be chiefly interested in manufactures; 
although for over thirty years after 1790 its commercial 
and fishing interests were stronger. 

374. Commerce.—Though the fisheries of New England 
had done fairly well during the years of war and unrest 
(1775-89), commerce had not thriven so well. Yet, even 
in those evil days, New England vessels kept up a trade 
with Europe. 2 From the Middle States they carried grain 
and flour; from Maryland and Virginia, tobacco; and from 
farther south, rice and indigo and, later on, cotton. For all 
their exports Europe paid in manufactured articles, so little 
made at this time in America. 

375. Interests of the South.—Thus, New England was the 
section chiefly affected by the new inventions for spinning, 
but though there especially we see the beginning of the 
manufacturing industry, there was one invention which 
immensely influenced the growth of the South. The South¬ 
erners had not raised much cotton as yet, because so much 
labor was needed to clear the seed from the fiber; a slave 
could clear only about two pounds a day. As a result, it 

1 Before this time there had been very few mills or factories of any 
kind in the United States. The weaving machinery did not come 
until 1813. 

2 Also with India, China, and the west coast of Africa. 




THE NATION IN WASHINGTON’S TIME 


227 


was profitable to raise only the long fiber variety, which 
was easily separated from the seed but could be raised only 
on the sea islands and on the low coast plains of the South 
Atlantic region. 

376. The Cotton Gin.—All this was changed when (1793) 
Eli Whitney, an inventive Yankee schoolmaster, made a 
cottton gin with which a slave could clean in a day fifty 
times as much as before. Thereupon it paid to raise cotton, 



Operating the Cotton Gin 


and, moreover, there was profit in the short-fibered or short- 
staple variety which could be raised far inland on the higher 
lands. This increased the interest of the South in slavery, 
because slaves were most profitable on the cotton plantation, 
and because the area of the plantation system was extended. 1 
Thus we shall see the economic interests of the North and 
South becoming, from 1790 on, more and more widely 
separated. These differences added to the difficulties of 
government and to the task of maintaining union. 

377. Lack of Means of Communication.—Nor was this 
difference between North and South the only danger to 
the republic. If men must travel by saddle horse and stage 

1 Another result was that New England in time was covered with 
cotton mills which used a good part of the Southern cotton crop. 


































228 


THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 


coach, and carry produce from place to place on land by wagon 
or at sea by slow sailing vessels, as they always had done, the 
people of the North and South, East and West, would continue 
to be strangers and feel little interest in each other. The new 
and far extending republic might not hold together, but 
might split up into little weak states or sections. When 
John Adams, in 1790, went to New York from Boston he took 
a stage coach, a large covered box mounted on springs, and 
by riding from three o’clock in the morning until ten at 
night, reached New York in six days. The roads were bad, 
and inns and taverns worse; neither Adams nor any other 
man took such a journey unless he had to go. 1 The roads 
were poor not only between North and South, hut also 
between East and West. When a government messenger 
went from New York to the frontier posts on the Mississippi, 
he was two months on the road. The bonds of interest 
between the East and the West were, as a result, very weak 
and there was danger of a new empire being formed -west of 
the mountains. 

378. Roads into the West.—So poor were the Western 

roads that pioneers going westward used to put their goods on 
a flatboat at the first point possible on the westward flowing 
rivers, and float down the streams to the point nearest to 
their destination. Because two great roads, one from 


1 Only two stages and twelve horses were needed to carry the 
travelers and their packages between New York and Boston. “ The 
conveyances were old and shackling; the harness made mostly of rope; 
the beasts were ill fed and worn to skeletons.” Not all the colonial 
vehicles were so bad, but the fact shows us how simple were the ways 
of our forefathers. The mails, carried by post-rider, were sent in¬ 
frequently and letters were long on the road. It sometimes took a 
month for a letter to go a distance now covered in less than a day. 
“The bad weather,” wrote Washington to Knox, February 20, 1784, 
“and the great care which the post-riders take of themselves, prevented 
your letter of the third and ninth of last month from getting into my 
hands until the tenth of this.” Washington was then at Mount Vernon, 
Knox, apparently, in one of the Northern states. 



THE NATION IN WASHINGTON’S TIME 229 

Philadelphia and another from Virginia and Maryland, led 
to Pittsburg on the Ohio, that city became the most thriving 
town west of the mountains. 1 Here the pioneers, placing 
their families in a long keel boat, while their goods and cattle 
were placed on flatboats, floated on flood waters down to 
their forest homes in Ohio or Kentucky. 2 But the river 
would not carry them back, and, therefore, when their 



Routes from Philadelphia and Virginia to Pittsburg and 

the Ohio 


farms began to produce more than they needed, they found 
trade with Eastern markets too slow and expensive. Again 
they loaded their produce on barges and rafts, and floated 
on down the Ohio and the Mississippi to New Orleans. 
There the Spaniards often troubled the Western traders 
so much that the people of Ohio and Kentucky became eager 
to win the Spanish possessions from them or to make a 


1 In 1790 it had two thousand people. 

2 The few towns on the river were Marietta, Galliopolis, Limestone 
(now Maysville), and Cincinnati. 









230 


THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 


political union with them. Here was another problem the 
new republic had to face. 1 

379. Bettering the Lot of the Poor and Unfortunate.— 

It is evident that there were many difficulties to be over¬ 
come if America was to hold together and to be a strong 
nation, because it was made up of so many differing sections 
and. each knew so little of the others. Moreover, there were 
social and political problems to be solved. First we may 
look at the social evils that needed reform. It was a time 
when prisoners were held in loathsome prisons, out of wdiich 
they came worse than they had entered. There was little 
effort to reform them and better their lot. Americans were, 
if anything, kinder to such unfortunates than European 
people were, but if there was to be a brotherhood of men 
such as Americans talked about, even more must still be 
done. A Christian spirit of humanity and sympathy was 
already abroad, and before our history ends we shall see it 
gain a much better lot for the debtor, the insane, and the 
criminal. 

380. Gain in Political Liberty. —In political reform 
America had gone a long way toward democracy, toward rule 
by the people, but still many people had no part in the govern¬ 
ment. The right to vote and hold office, in some states, was 
granted only to those who owned a certain number of acres of 
land, or had an income of so many dollars. In some places 

1 The trip down the Ohio was sometimes disagreeable, but some¬ 
times pleasant. One of the founders of Marietta has given us an in¬ 
teresting account of his trip and of how they started the new settlement. 
(See Hart, “American History Told by Contemporaries,” vol. iii, 
p. 102.) “At two o’clock p.m.,” he writes, “our boat—Oh, Be Joyful— 
hove in sight, coming around the point, and, in half an hour w r as made 
fast at Pittsburg. She is forty-two feet long and twelve feet wide, with 
cover. She will carry a burden of forty-five tons, and draws only two 
and one-half feet water. . . . Cast off our fasts, and committed our¬ 
selves to the current of the Ohio. The scene was beautiful. Without 
wind or waves we, insensibly almost, make more than five miles an 
hour.” 



THE NEW GOVERNMENT 


231 


there were still religious qualifications for voters and office¬ 
holders. In New England the rich and well born, led by the 
Congregational clergy, were still the political masters of the 
poor laborers and shopkeepers—the “ lower orders ” as they 
were called. All this rule by a select few we shall see swept 
away as a result of a great democratic movement which 
began before 1800. 


Suggested Readings 

Histories: Hart, Formation of the Union, 103-139. McMaster, 
History of the People of the United States, II, 1-25. Walker, Mak¬ 
ing of the Nation, 64-72. Eggleston, The United States and its 
People, ch. 34. Southworth, Builders of our Country, II, 123. 

Sources: Hart, American History Told hy Contemporaries, III, 
Nos. 12, 14-17, 19-24, 25-30, 31-3G. Hart, Source Readers, No. III. 


CHAPTER XXVI 

STARTING THE NEW GOVERNMENT—THE FEDERALISTS 

381. Washington, the First President of the United States. 

—After the people in their state conventions had approved 
of the new Constitution, the old Congress, before dying, set 
a date for the election of a President and a new Congress 
such as the new form of government called for. Then the 
states chose presidential electors, who met in each state and 
voted for two persons. 1 The person having the most elec¬ 
toral votes became, as the Constitution provided, President 
of the United States. As Washington had no rival in the 
hearts of his countrymen, every elector voted for him, and 
he became first President of the country for which he had 
done so much. John Adams was elected Vice President—an 
office which he thought “ so wholly insignificant ” that soon 
after taking it he wished himself “ again at the bar.” 

1 See the Constitution, Art. II, Sec. 1, Cl. 3. This method of voting 
was changed by the Twelfth Amendment. 



232 


THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 


382. Washington’s Inauguration.—The Congress, elected 
at the same time, came together slowly. It was April before 
a quorum in both Senate and House was assembled. The 
electoral vote was then counted and Washington, at Mt. 
Vernon, was notified of his election. His journey to New 
York, the first seat of government, was a triumphal march. 
From town to town he was escorted by the people who loved 
him. Flowers were strewn in his path, an arch of triumph 



Wall Street in 1789 

The large building at the right of the picture is Federal Hall, the church at 

the end of the street is Trinity. 


spanned his road, and a barge manned by thirteen pilots 1 
carried him from the Jersey shore to New York. April 30, 
1789, on the balcony of Federal Flail, Washington took the 
oath of office. 2 Entering the hall he read to the assembled 
Senate and House, in a voice shaken with emotion, an address 


1 Though there were as yet but eleven states, for Rhode Island and 
North Carolina had not entered the Union. 

2 See the Constitution, Art. II, Sec. 1, Cl. 8. 


























THE NEW GOVERNMENT 


233 


in which he urged men not to forget that the eyes of the 
world were watching them to see what they would make of 
their experiment of liberty. 

383. Departments Created.—Washington alone could not 
carry on all the work of enforcing the laws, so Congress or¬ 
ganized four executive departments, the same departments 
that had been found necessary by the Continental Congress: 
(1) Foreign Affairs, (2) the Treasury, (3) War, and (4) the 
Post Office. To head these departments Washington selected 
Thomas Jefferson, Alexander Hamilton, Henry Knox, and 
Samuel Osgood, and the Senate confirmed his choice. Edmund 
Randolph was made Attorney-General. 

384. Courts Established.—The judicial department of the 
government was then created. Congress provided by law 
for a supreme court and three circuit courts. 1 John Jay, a 
man of noble character, was made Chief Justice. In his case 
the ermine which the justice wore rested, it is said, upon a 
man as pure as itself. 

385. The Cabinet a Result of Growth.—The presence of 
strong, able men like Jefferson, Hamilton, and Knox was of 
great service to Washington, who had had no experience in 
carrying on a great government. The Constitution permitted 
him to ask their opinions in writing, and soon he began to 
ask them to meet him to talk over public matters. Thus, as 
a mere matter of custom, the Cabinet, as this group of 
advisers was called, 2 grew to be an important part of our 
government. 

386. Dignity and Democracy.—The new administration 
was criticised a good deal from the first. It had to be 
dignified, and, at the same time, must avoid the pomp by 
which governments had always before made people stand 
in awe. To distinguish the President from the common men 


1 See the Constitution, Art. Ill, Sec. 1. 

2 The Cabinet was first made up of the Secretaries of State, Treasury, 
and War, and the Attorney-General. 



234 


THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 


there was talk of giving him the title “ His Highness” or 
“ His Patriotic Majesty.” The House of Representatives, 
however, called him plain “Mr. President,” and so he has 
been addressed ever since. Washington himself, a born 
aristocrat, was rather stiff, and his formal receptions, where 
none could come without invitation cards, offended many 
good plain souls. Good men all over the land shook their 
heads and said it would all end in monarchy. 1 Besides this, 
the people could not at first get used to national officers 
coming into the states to enforce national laws. 2 The 
customhouse officers at Boston, New York, and Charleston 
were looked at askance as agents of an imperial system, for 
in the persons of these officers, the new central government 
was actually seen and felt. 

387. The First Tariff.—These customs officers were soon 
needed, for one of the first things Congress had to do was to 
devise a source of revenue for the United States Government. 
To lay duties on imports was the most natural thing to do. 
The kind of things, however, which the members of Congress 
were willing to have taxed varied greatly, because each 
section had different industries and manufactures, and 
wished the tariff so adjusted as to favor them. They finally 
managed to patch up a bill, for the government needed 
money and needed it at once. 

388. Hamilton’s Financial Policy: (a) The Foreign and 
Domestic Debt.—The debts, the relics of the Revolution, 
must be paid if the United States was to hold up its head 
proudly among the nations of the world. There were people 
who talked of ways of reducing the debt by pajdng part and 
refusing to pay the rest, and all that sort of thing, as if there 
were any honest way to be rid of a debt except to pay it. 


1 It all proved harmless enough, and presidents soon after were very 
democratic in bearing and behavior. 

2 Formerly, if Congress wanted things done, it asked the states to 
have their officers do them. 




THE NEW GOVERNMENT 235 

Hamilton, the Secretary of the Treasury, reporting on the 
debt owed at home and in foreign countries, proposed that 
the new government should honestly pay it all. Of course 

there was no money with which 
the debts could be paid all at 
once, but Hamilton showed how 
the debt could be cared for by 
the issue of new bonds in place 
of the old certificates, and by 
making yearly provision for in¬ 
terest and for the gradual pay¬ 
ment of the principal. So the 
plan was carried. 

389. (b) The Assumption of 
State Debts.—He also asked Con¬ 
gress to assume and pay the state 
debts. They were, he said, the 
result of fighting for the common 
cause. But there was a good deal 
of objection, especially in some 
Southern States, whose debts were 
not so large as those of the North. But finally the assump¬ 
tion bill was passed by means of a bargain. Jefferson got 
Southern votes for assumption, and Hamilton, in return, got 
Northern votes in favor of selecting a site on the Potomac for 
the national capital. 

390. (c) A National Bank.—Hamilton now set before Con¬ 
gress a third measure to strengthen the government. He 
asked that a great Bank of the United States be chartered 
by Congress. There would be many stockholders, but the 
government would be chief, and would deposit its money 
with the bank. Hamilton believed that it would be very use¬ 
ful, but there arose fierce opposition to the whole scheme. 
Jefferson said that Congress had no right to pass such a bill 
because it had only the powers granted by the Constitution 
and the right to do what was necessary and proper to carry 










THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 



1 See the Constitution, Art. I, Sec. 8, Cl. 18. 


23b 


(C 


The First Bank of the United States 


those powers into effect. 1 A bank, he said, was not “ neces¬ 
sary.” Hamilton argued that while it was true that the 
powers of Congress 
were limited by the 
Constitution, it had 
the right to employ 
such useful means as 
it saw fit to do the 
work intrusted to it. 

Washington finally 
signed the bill. Thus 
began the great con¬ 
test which is not 
ended yet, between 
those who wish Con¬ 
gress to do nothing 
which the Consti¬ 
tution does not ex¬ 
pressly say Congress can do, and those who wish Congress 
to have great freedom of “ interpretation,” that is, of get¬ 
ting from every word and phrase of the Constitution all pos¬ 
sible power for the national government. 

391. (d) The Excise Tax and The Whisky Rebellion.—An¬ 
other measure which Hamilton got Congress to pass w T as a tax 
on whisky, an excise tax. He wished, for one thing, to get that 
source of revenue for the central government. If men would 
drink, they might as well “ drink down the national debt,” 
it was said. But the men beyond the mountains did not like 
taxation, and, above all, a tax on liquor. The back country of 
Pennsylvania rose in rebellion, and tax collectors were driven 
away by mobs. Now there was a chance to see what the new 
government was good for. Militia were called out by the 
President, and with Hamilton at their head marched to 
Pittsburg (1794). Then the rebels yielded. It was a puny 
rebellion, but it very clearly showed that the central govern- 























THE NEW GOVERNMENT 


237 


merit’s power could go within the sacred bounds of a state 
and compel the people there to obey the laws of Congress. 

392. Results of Hamilton’s Work.—The results of Hamil¬ 
ton’s financial measures were most notable. Confidence in 
the new government was seen at once both at home and in 
Europe. People who had been hiding money rather than 
to risk losing it, now began to invest it in trade and manu¬ 
factures, banks, and canal companies. Our government, 
which had been unable to borrow anywhere except at 
shameful rates of interest, had as good credit now as other 
nations. Daniel Webster said of Hamilton long after, 
“ He smote the rock of national resources and abundant 
streams of revenue gushed forth. He touched the dead 
corpse of public credit and it sprang upon its feet.” 

393. The Beginnings of Political Parties.—Many, how¬ 
ever, were now fearing that the power of the government 
might grow to be too great, and it was fortunate that against 
Hamilton and his idea of a strong central government should 
rise Thomas Jefferson to defend the rights of the states and 
the masses of the people. The differing ideals of these two 
leaders as to the way men should be ruled came to be the 
ideals of two great political parties which began very soon 
to fight for control of the new government. The struggle 
began in Washington’s Cabinet, where these two men faced 
each other “ like cocks in a pit.” We can best understand the 
political ideas of the people who took sides with one or the 
other of these men by a brief study of their characters. 

394. Hamilton, a Lover of Order and Strong Government. 
—Hamilton’s boyhood had been spent on the Island of Nevis 
in the West Indies. He came to Kings College in New York 
for his college education, and when the Revolution broke 
out this boy of eighteen wrote patriotic pamphlets that 
drew wide attention. In Washington’s army he gained the 
love and esteem of his commander, and became his secretary. 
Here he saw the necessity of strict control of the common 
soldier by the superior officers. He had not much confidence 


238 


THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 


in the masses of the people, for he believed that they needed 
to be led by the gifted few who had reason and judgment. 
He probably believed that a monarchy like England’s was 
the best kind of government. Though the Constitution 
when it was formed did not altogether please him, he worked 
for its adoption and was now determined to make as strong a 
government as possible. He was the ideal man to give it 
strength and dignity. 

395. Jefferson, a Lover of Freedom and a Friend of the 
People.—Set over against him was Jefferson the democrat, 
fighting the battles of the plain people. His early life had 
been spent in the democratic back country of Virginia. He 
had, while a member of Congress, drawn up the Declaration 
of Independence for the whole American people, but soon 
he became Governor of Virginia and found his chief interest 
in the state, rather than the nation. He feared that a great 
national government would crush the people. The govern¬ 
ments of Europe appeared to him to feed the silken nobility 
with the food of the laborer. He believed that the common 
sense of the people was the wisest guide, and that if men 
were free they would in the end do right. Jefferson’s 
enemies called him a “dreamer,” “visionary and un¬ 
sound,” and he surely was an idealist, often blind to prac¬ 
tical results. 

396. The Contrast Between Party Leaders.—If we put side 
by side what these two men stood for it will help us to under¬ 
stand the struggles of the two great parties throughout our 
history. Hamilton stood for effective government, Jefferson 
for a free government. One led the party of authority and or¬ 
der, the other the party of ideals and liberty. Hamilton 
worried over the dangers of anarchy, Jefferson over the evils 
of government. 

397. The Federalists and the Republicans.—The follow¬ 
ers of Hamilton called themselves Federalists. 1 Those who 

John Adams, John Marshall, ihomas Pinckney were leading men 
of that party. 




THE NEW GOVERNMENT 


239 


believed with Jefferson took the name Republican, 1 but 
were often called Democrats. Before the end of Washing¬ 
ton’s first term the division of the people was plain to all. 
The Federalists were most numerous in the commercial 
states like New England and New York, whose business 
men liked Hamilton’s financial measures, and whose foreign 
trade grew as America became respected. In the agricultural 
states, like Virginia and North Carolina, Jefferson’s followers 
were found in large numbers, for farmers did not feel the 
need of a strong central government, and they liked Jeffer¬ 
son’s confidence in the plain people. Though party differ¬ 
ences began to show themselves clearly before the end of 
Washington’s first administration, he was elected again with¬ 
out opposition (1792). 

398. American Sympathy with the French Revolution.— 

Trouble soon came to America as a result of conditions in 
Europe. The common people in France had set up a republic 
and beheaded their king and queen as well as many of the 
richest and noblest Frenchmen. They were now at war 
with the other countries of Europe, whose rulers feared the 
revolution would spread to their own kingdoms. Jefferson 
and the greater part of the American people at first sym¬ 
pathized with France in this war, and hoped for her success. 
“ Liberty will have another feather in her cap ” was the cry. 
Was France not a sister republic guided by our ideals, 
besides being our late friend and ally? Hamilton and 
Washington, seeing the danger that we might be drawn into 
the war, answered coldly that France had helped us because 
it was to her interest, that her democracy was an unreasoning 
madness and not our kind, and that we must take care not 
to ruin our own true republic trying to save this false one. 
It was a hard tide for Washington’s administration to stem, 
however, for men w T ere wild with enthusiasm. 2 

1 Madison, Monroe, and Gerry were Republicans. 

2 A United States Senator wrote, “Royalty, nobility, and vile 
pageantry, by which a few of the human race lord it over and tread on 



240 


THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 


399. Citizen Genet; the Proclamation of Neutrality, 1793. 

—In the midst of this folly and excitement the French 
republican government declared war against England, and 
sent a new representative to America, Citizen Genet, as he 
was called, to get our help. When he arrived, Washington 
had to decide at once what to do. He called his Cabinet and 
they decided to send out what is now known as a “ Proclama¬ 
tion of Neutrality.” All citizens were warned not to aid 
either of the fighting nations. With this wise action began 
America’s policy of keeping out of European quarrels. 

400. Genet is Overbold.—When the Proclamation appeared, 
Genet had already landed at Charleston and was making his 
way toward Philadelphia amid ovations such as Washington 
himself had not seen while on his recent tour in the South. 
All went well until he reached the seat of government, where 
Washington received him so coldly that he wrote home, 
“ This old man is not what history has painted him.” So 
set up was he by his success with the people that he tried 
to override the President and his wishes, but Washington 
was firm, and at last asked the French Government for 
Genet’s recall. 

401. England Makes Trouble.—Because Washington strove 
to prevent the young nation from being dragged into the 
European war, his political enemies accused him of favoring 
“our old enemy, England.” In truth he was having a sorry 
time with England. She had refused to give up the posts 
on the Northern frontier, declaring that we had not carried 
out our part of the treaty of 1783. Her ships seized 

the necks of their fellow mortals seems likely to be demolished.” All 
French victories were celebrated with the wildest joy and toasts were 
drunk to them at every inn. Bells were rung, liberty poles erected, and 
a flaming liberty cap kept in every house. Men aped the Jacobins, 
the worst of the French revolutionists, by calling each other “ citizen. ”' 
Men objected even to addresses like “His Honor, the Judge,” or even 
“ Reverend.” “ Diabolical terms ” they were called. Children ate “ civic 
cakes” stamped with the republican watchwords “Liberty” and 
4t Equality.” Choirs sang “ Down with these earthly kings.” 



THE NEW GOVERNMENT 241 

American ships on the high seas, and in other ways she took 
advantage of her strength. 

402. Trouble with the Indians.—Moreover, the Indians, in 
part encouraged by the British retention of the northern 
posts and by the British desire to keep the fur trade, were 
very hostile to the Americans, whom they called “ the long 
knives.” The story of Indian attacks upon the lonely frontier 
is a pitiful tale of bloodshed. Two large American armies 
were beaten before General Wayne —“ Mad Anthony”— 
overwhelmed the savages near the Maumee Rapids, Ohio 
(August 18, 1794). In this campaign Wayne earned a new 
proud title—“ The Chief that never sleeps.” 

403. The Jay Treaty.—Before this final victory over the 
Indians, Washington had sent Jay to England with orders 
to settle our troubles if he could. Jay had a hard task, but he 
finally brought home a treaty which, if not altogether fair, 
at least provided for turning over to us the frontier forts. 
The unthinking people were mad with rage over our failure 
to obtain all that we wanted. Jay was hanged in effigy. 
Hamilton was stoned when he tried to speak in defense of 
Jay’s work, and altogether there was a very serious time. 
The treaty, somewhat modified, was finally (June 24, 1795) 
ratified by the Senate, however, and the awful danger of 
war with England was over. 

404. The Mississippi; the Spanish Treaty of 1795.—Spain 
owned the territory on both sides of the Mississippi for 
some distance from the mouth. After Anthony Wayne’s 
victory and the British abandonment of the Northwest 
posts, the one thing desired by the Western people was that 
Spain would open up the Mississippi to commerce, that 
they might raft their tobacco and grain to the sea-going 
ships at New Orleans. The demand for this trade was so press¬ 
ing that there were two great dangers—one that the people 
on the Western rivers would break away from the United 
States and unite with Spain, or, second, that the frontiersmen 
would themselves attack Spain’s American colony in Louisi- 


242 


THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 



ana and thus plunge the United States into war. This 
danger was averted in 1795 by a treaty with Spain wherein 
she granted a place of deposit at New Orleans for American 
farm products while awaiting 
shipment abroad in sea-going 
vessels. This and her giving up 
of some disputed posts in the 
Southwest insured peace with 
Spain. 

405. Washington Gives Up 
Public Life, 1797.—Thus Wash¬ 
ington’s wise forbearance and 
good sense had warded off the 
danger of war throughout eight 
trying years. When he was urged to accept a third term of 
the presidency he refused, for he was tired of office and 
longed for rest on his beloved estate at Mt. Vernon. In his 
“ Farewell Address,” worthy to be read as long as our nation 
lives, he set forth some nobly patriotic and statesmanlike 
ideas. Union he declared to be the main pillar of inde¬ 
pendence, prosperity, and liberty. “ Observe justice and 
faith towards all nations,” he urged, but have entangling 
alliances with none. “ In a word,” he said, “ be a nation, 
be American, and be true to yourselves.” With this solemn 
advice he returned (1797) to Mt. Vernon to die, as he wished 
to live, “ amid the mild concerns of ordinary life.” 


Map Showing Spanish Con¬ 
trol of the Mouth of 
the Mississippi 


Suggested Readings 

Histories: Lodge, George 'Washington. Scudder, George Washing¬ 
ton. Lodge, Alexander Hamilton. Morse, Thomas Jefferson. Flson, 
Side Lights on American History, I, 54-79. Walker, Making of the 
Nation, 78-1G8. Hart, Formation of the Union. Sparks, Men Who 
Made the Nation. Conant, Alexander Hamilton. Merwin, Thomas 
Jefferson. Barton, Four American Patriots. Butterworth, In the 
Days of Jefferson. 

Sources: Hart, Source Book, 181-186. 











FOREIGN TROUBLES AND DOMESTIC FACTIONS 243 


CHAPTER XXVII 


FOREIGN TROUBLES AND DOMESTIC FACTIONS 

406. Presidential Candidates, 1796.—When a successor of 
Washington was to be elected, the parties which had been 
forming during his second term each had a candidate. John 
Adams, a more moderate Federalist than Hamilton, was rec¬ 
ommended to the electors of that party. 1 Thomas Jeffer¬ 
son, the founder of the Republican 
Party, was its choice for President. 

407. President and Vice President 
“in Opposite Boxes.”—Adams was 
barely elected by three electoral 
votes, and as Jefferson had the next 
greatest number he became Vice 
President. Thus there was the cu¬ 
rious spectacle of a President asso¬ 
ciated with a political rival as Vice 
President—to succeed him if he died 
in office. 

408. France Becomes Imperti- 
's/ZWj) nent .—Hardly had Adams been 

inaugurated (March, 1797) when 
news came that our minister to France, C. C. Pinckney, had 
been rejected by the Directory, as the five men were called 
who then governed the French republic. Jay’s treaty was 
our offense—an insult to France, the Directory said. The 
truth was that it ended the French hope that we would 
fight England. In their wrath the French began seizing 
American vessels, only failing to do as much damage as 
England had done because they had not naval power to do 
it. Adams called Congress, asking it to show France that 
we were not a “ degraded people ” with a “ spirit of fear and 

1 There was no national convention to nominate candidates as now, 
but it was generally understood who were candidates. 




244 


THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 


sense of inferiority.” It seemed best, however, to avoid war 
if possible, and Adams sent John Marshall, a Federalist, 
with Elbridge Gerry, a Republican, to join Pinckney in an 
effort to make honorable terms with France. 

409. People Aroused by “X, Y, Z.”— When they reached 

Paris they were not greeted in the honorable manner due 
to the representatives of a dignified nation. Instead, they 
were met by messengers from the French minister. 1 These 
messengers, when the dispatch sent home by the Americans 
was published, were named “X,” “Y,” and “ Z.” They 
made most dishonest proposals. They wanted $50,000 as a 
bribe for each member of the Directory, besides a sum loaned 
to the government. “It is expected that you will offer 
money,” said “X.” “ What is your answer? ” “It is no! 

NO! not a sixpence,” was the sturdy reply. 

Our commissioners wrote to Adams, telling of this proposal 
and that “ X,” “ Y,” and “ Z ” had said the President of the 
United States must apologize for his language and that money 
must be lent to France. This letter Adams published, and 
every American, Federalist or Republican was indignant. 
“ Millions for defense, but not one cent for tribute ” was the 
general cry. Though the Republicans were against an army 
or navy lest it strengthen the government, yet many then 
voted to prepare for war. Everyone thrilled with patriotism, 
and sang the new song, “ Hail Columbia.” 

410. War with France on the Ocean.—The President 
declared that he would never send another minister to 
France unless assured that he would be received as “repre¬ 
sentative of a great, free, powerful, and independent state.” 
Everybody was pleased. French flags were torn down, and 
at sea, battles were actually fought. 

411. Adams Secures an Honorable Treaty.—But John 
Adams did not lose his head and did not forget that it was the 

1 They seem to have been sent by Talleyrand, an astute and un¬ 
principled diplomat, who hoped to profit by the desire of the Uni tea 
States to make peace. 



FOREIGN TROUBLES AND DOMESTIC FACTIONS 245 


Directory and not the French people that had acted dis¬ 
honorably. The French Government became alarmed and 
Adams felt confident that a minister would be honorably 
received. Three commissioners were sent. The com¬ 
missioners found Napoleon Bonaparte ruler of France, and 
with him a treaty was soon concluded. Adams was very 
proud of this peace. It was indeed wise statesmanship, 
but it offended Hamilton and his friends. 

412. The Alien and Sedition Laws.—This split in the 
Federalists' party began their downfall, but they did a num¬ 
ber of other things which hastened their overthrow. They 
misused the power which their resistance to France had 
given them—carrying their idea of a strong government 
dangerously near to despotism. Through Congress they 
passed (1) the Naturalization Act, by which foreigners 
must live fourteen years (instead of five years as before) in 
America before they could become citizens; (2) the Alien 
Act, by which the President was given power to send for¬ 
eigners out of the United States if he thought them danger¬ 
ous; 1 (3) the Sedition Act, to stop people from saying or 
writing bitter things against the government. Any attempt 
to defame or bring into disrepute any part of the government 
might be punished by fine or prison. Men were to be tried 
for these offenses in the Federal Courts. 

413. The Acts Make Enemies for the Federalists.—The 
first two acts might be excused as war measures when the 
French war threatened, but the last was indefensible, for if 
it is a crime to criticise government how is misgovernment 
to become known? 2 The Federalists even had the folly to 
bring some Republican editors to trial, and every trial raised 
up a thousand votes against the Federalists. It seemed a 


1 President Adams paid no attention to this law and it did no harm 
save in principle. 

2 Newspapers were very scurrilous at this time, and pamphleteers, 
escaped from France and England, were writing vicious things. 



246 


THE RISE OF STRONG GOVERNMENT 


plain effort to gag the press, which Jefferson thought more 
important to freedom than government. 

414. The Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions.—Jefferson 
and Madison led the resistance to these most unpopular 
laws. They got the legislatures of Virginia and Kentucky 
to pass resolutions denouncing the acts and urging the other 
states to act with them in opposition to the laws. There 
is still some difference of opinion as to what these resolutions 
meant; but they certainly were 
a very sharp declaration that 
the Federal Government could 
not rightly do everything it 
might choose to do. They are 
chiefly important from the fact 
that in later years they were 
quoted to prove that Jefferson 
and Madison were the fathers 
of nullification and secession. 1 

415. The People Turn to Jeff¬ 
erson and Democracy.— The 
people were now turning against 
the Federalist Party. They did 
not like the high and mighty 
ideas of government, which Fed¬ 
eralist leaders loved so much. 

Jefferson and his faith in the 
people, his belief in free speech, and his love of peace pleased 
the common men of America. They were tired of all this talk 
about the need of strong government; they felt as if they 
could look after their own business without quite so many 
orders from above. 

1 In 1832, as we shall see, there was danger of war with South Carolina 
because that State “nullified” an act of Congress, i. e., declared the act 
must not be enforced within the State. In 1861 came the trial of 
“secession.” It is at least doubtful whether the Virginia and Ken¬ 
tucky resolutions meant that a state might nullify or secede. 









FOREIGN TROUBLES AND DOMESTIC FACTIONS 247 


416. Jefferson or Burr?—The contest of 1800 was begun by 
the leaders of each party meeting in what came to be called 
a caucus and naming the candidates for whom the electors 
chosen by each party would be expected to vote. John 
Adams was chosen as the Federalist candidate for President. 
The Republican candidates were Thomas Jefferson for 
President and Aaron Burr—a most dangerous political 
intriguer, brilliant but unprincipled—for Vice President. 
There was a violent campaign, embittered by personal 
attacks, which ended in the election of sixty-five electors 
who voted for John Adams and seventy-three who voted for 
Jefferson. But the seventy-three electors also voted for Burr. 
Jefferson and Burr were tied, though both belonged to the 
same party. Neither could, under the Constitution, be re¬ 
garded as legally elected to the presidential office. The con¬ 
test was now removed to the House of Representatives, where 
the Federalists had a majority. 1 They could have elected 
Burr, and they might have done so but that Hamilton, who 
knew Burr to be an intriguer, used his influence with the 
Federalists in behalf of Jefferson, who was chosen. 2 

417. Federalists’ Work Finished.—With this defeat the 
Federalists’ power was broken. They had done a great 
service in setting up a strong, honest government which won 
the world’s respect. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: McMaster, History of the People of the United States , 
II (see Index). Morse, John Adams. Lodge, Alexander Hamilton. 
Walker, Making of the Nation. 

Sources: Mace, Working Manual of American History, 231-232. 


1 Notice, first, that such an election in the House is made by members 
chosen two years or more before this time—when the “XYZ” fever 
was at its height; second, that the vote is by states. See Constitu¬ 
tion, Art. II, Sec. 1, Cl. 3, and also Amendment XII. 

2 The danger, thus scarcely averted, of having a man elected as Presi¬ 
dent whom the people never intended to be more than Vice President, 
led to the adoption of the Twelfth Amendment, which changed the origi¬ 
nal plan provided by the Constitution for election of the President. 



V 

PERIOD OF JEFFERSONIAN DEMOCRACY 
AND THE GROWTH OF A TRUE 
AMERICAN SPIRIT 

CHAPTER XXVIII 

JEFFERSONIAN DEMOCRACY AND AMERICAN 

EXPANSION 


418. Jefferson, President, 1801-9.—Just before the end 
of John Adams’ administration the national capital was 
removed from Philadelphia 1 to Washington, and there in a 



J. 


An Early View of Washington 
From a contemporary drawing. 

“palace in the woods,” as the new capitol building was 
sneeringly called, 2 Jefferson was inaugurated. He endeared 
himself to the plain people at once by his “ republican 
simplicity.” Instead of going in state, as Adams had done, in 
a coach drawn by six cream-colored horses, he walked quietly 

1 Whither it was removed in 1790 from New York City. 

2 It stood on a hill overlooking the Potomac; about it was a straggling 
village with a few hundred inhabitants. 

248 




























JEFFERSONIAN DEMOCRACY 


249 


to his inauguration. He at once made men feel that the 
government was in the people’s hands and not in those of 
the upper classes. There were no more stiff receptions, but 
in a cordial, hearty way Jefferson shook hands with all who 
came to see him. It was no wonder that the people liked 
Jefferson, and that Congress was always ready to do his 
will. 1 

419. Economy and Simplicity.—His administration was 
begun in a businesslike, democratic way. He did not go in 
state to Congress with a formal address, like those of Wash¬ 
ington and Adams, but sent in a written message such as all 
Presidents now send. Bearing out the principles of his 
inaugural address, he got Congress to cut down the army 
and navy—small though they already were—and tried to 
rid the people of their national debt. 2 “ Economy in the 
public expense,” was his motto, and he hoped for “ peace, 
commerce, and honest friendship with all nations.” 3 He 
hoped that Americans would never be burdened as Euro¬ 
peans were by heavy taxes to support armies and a spend¬ 
thrift government. Finally, the tax laws which had caused 
the Whisky Rebellion and the Fries Rebellion 4 were repealed, 
because the careful economy of Jefferson made them un¬ 
necessary. 

429. France Gets Louisiana; We Want New Orleans.— 

In the midst of his efforts to save money, and in spite of his 


1 The extreme Federalists did not like him. They thought of him as 
a destroyer of government and they believed his political principles 
to be dangerous to society. 

2 The debt sunk rapidly from $83,000,000 in 1801 to $45,000,000 in 
1812. 

3 He said: “The sum of good government is a wise and frugal govern¬ 
ment which shall restrain men from injuring one another, and shall 
leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits.” 

4 To pay the expenses of the expected French war, 1798, the Federal¬ 
ists had laid a direct tax upon land, houses, and slaves, and one John 
Fries in Pennsylvania led a small rebellion against this tax, but the 
rebels were subdued and the tax law enforced. 



250 


GROWTH OF AMERICAN SPIRIT 


desire to do nothing which the Constitution did not plainly 
give him a right to do, Jefferson was obliged (1803) to buy 
the vast territory of Louisiana. The necessity arose in the 
following manner. We have seen 1 how the Western people 
of Kentucky, Tennessee, and Ohio, before the days of canals 
and railroads, used the Mississippi as a highway to the sea. 
The West needed to control the Mississippi, or, at least have 
a place of deposit at New Orleans, where the products they 
had carried down the river on the great flatboats might be 
taken by ocean-going ships. “ There is one spot ” (New 
Orleans), said Jefferson, “ the possessor of which is our natural 
and habitual enemy.” Spain had owned it after 1763, and 
by treaty (1795) 2 gave the right of deposit to the Americans, 
but in 1800 Spain, in a secret treaty, ceded Louisiana to 
France. Napoleon, the French ruler, promised to make 
Louisiana a 11 wall of brass forever impenetrable to the com¬ 
bined efforts of England and America ”—for both nations 
wanted it. 

421. A Mission to Franca, 1803.—For a time Jefferson was 
not sure that France owned New Orleans, but if it were true, 
he said, “ we must marry ourselves to the British fleet and 
nation.” Suddenly there happened just what Jefferson 
feared. By order of the Spanish intendant the port of New 
Orleans was closed, the flatboats of Western traders were 
seized, and the West turned angrily to the President, demand¬ 
ing relief. Jefferson acted quickly. He sent James Monroe 
to France to try to buy New Orleans and the land known as 
West Florida, lying east of the Mississippi, 3 which it was 
thought Spain had also sold to France. 

422. Purchase of Louisiana, 1803.—Before Monroe reached 
France, Napoleon had changed his plans. He was about to 
make war on England, and he knew that her strong navy 
would at once seize Louisiana if it belonged to France. To 
Livingston, the American minister, Napoleon suddenly 


1 See p. 241. 


2 See p. 242. 


3 See map facing this page. 

















JEFFERSONIAN DEMOCRACY 


251 



offered to sell the whole of Louisiana. It was a great oppor¬ 
tunity, and when Monroe arrived the two men haggled a 
while over the price, but finally agreed to pay $15,000,000 
for this vast domain. A treaty was drawn up and sent to 
Jefferson. 

423. Jefferson Questions the Right to Buy. —The treaty, 
before it became binding, had to be approved by the Presi¬ 
dent and two thirds of 
the Senate. Jefferson hes¬ 
itated, for the Constitu¬ 
tion did not say in so 
many words that terri¬ 
tory might be bought, 
and he doubtless remem¬ 
bered his debate with 
Hamilton about the bank 
bill. He was persuaded 
to yield, however; the 
treaty was signed, and 
thus he became, for the 
moment, at least, a broad 
constructionist like Ham¬ 
ilton. 

424. Lewis and Clark 
Go Westward, 1804-6.— 

A large part of this great 
purchase was unexplored, 
and Jefferson, with money 
voted by Congress, soon 
sent Meriwether Lewis 
and William Clark 1 to 
learn what he had bought. From St. Louis they paddled 
their boats for sixteen hundred miles up the muddy Mis¬ 
souri or marched along the shore. Part of the time on the 


Signing the Louisiana Purchase 
Treaty 

From a tablet in St. Louis, sculptured 
by Karl Bitter. Livingston is seated, 
Monroe is standing behind him, and 
Marbois, the French representative, is 
signing the treaty. 


1 Brother of General George Rogers Clark. 














252 


GROWTH OF AMERICAN SPIRIT 


upper river they were guided by the Indian “Bird Woman , 19 
as they called her. When at last the river became a trick¬ 
ling stream, they left it and, after riding and marching 
across the mountain divide, came to a westward flowing 
river. This they followed to its mouth, where the lifting 
of a fog which hung over the waters revealed the river roll¬ 
ing seaward “ in waves like small mountains.” It proved 
to be the Columbia River, which Captain Gray, in a Boston 



Routes of Lewis and Clark and Pike. 


ship, had entered in 1792. This second discovery strength¬ 
ened the claim which the United States was later to make 
upon the Oregon territory through which the Columbia 
flows. 1 These discoveries and John Jacob Astor’s fur-trad¬ 
ing post, set up there in 1811, gave us in time a sea front 
on the Pacific, most important for our future relations with 
Asia. 

425. Fulton Makes the Steamboat a Success, 1807. —Soon 
after the purchase of Louisiana came the invention of 
the steamboat, which gave the American people a means to 

1 In the meanwhile, Zebulon Pike had explored Kansas and Colorado 
and given the nation some idea of what had been bought in that direc¬ 
tion. 










JEFFERSONIAN DEMOCRACY 253 

conquer this great wilderness region. Years before (1790) 
John Fitch had experimented with steam as a means of 
driving boats, but certain success came only in 1807 when 
Robert Fulton’s boat, the Clermont , made its way at the 
rate of four miles an hour against the current of the Hudson 
River. On the trial day many came to jeer, and when a 

defect stopped the 
boat for a moment 
they cried “ Fail¬ 
ure!” To every¬ 
one’s surprise, how¬ 
ever, it soon started 
again, steaming 
away toward Al¬ 
bany. Within four 
years there was 

Fulton’s Steamboat, the Clermont. suc h a boat on the 

Ohio and Missis¬ 
sippi, and in 1818 the Walk-in-the-Water voyaged from 
Buffalo to Detroit, on Lake Erie. This saving of human 
toil in the navigation of rivers and lakes was of vast impor¬ 
tance in the peopling of the great West. Sailing boats and 
flatboats, poled by weary men, would have been a poor 
means for establishing the trade and commerce of the West. 



Suggested Readings 

Histories: Hosmer, Short History of the Mississippi Valley . 
Roosevelt, Winning of the West, vol. iv, ch. vii. McMurry, Pio¬ 
neers of the Rocky Mountains. Kingsley, The Story of Lewis and 
Clark. Hart, Formation of the Union, 176-180, 185-187. Schouler, 
Thomas Jefferson. Coffin, Building of the Nation. Sparks, Expan¬ 
sion of the American People, 381-384. Wright, Stories of American 
Progress, 104-120. 

Sources: Hart, American History Told hy Contemporaries, III, 
367-372, 381-384. 














































254 


GROWTH OF AMERICAN SPIRIT 


CHAPTER XXIX 

THE STRUGGLE TO SECURE AMERICAN RIGHTS 

WITHOUT WAR 

426. The Twelfth Amendment.—Before the election, of 
1804 an amendment to the Constitution was adopted to 
prevent the danger that arose in 1800 when Burr, who the 
people never intended should be anything but Vice President, 
came very near election to the presidency. The new amend¬ 
ment provided that each elector should vote for President 
and Vice President on separate ballots. The rest of the old 
clumsy system was kept, and we have it to this day. 1 

427. Jefferson Reelected in 1804.—Under this new con¬ 
stitutional provision Jefferson was elected President and 
George Clinton, Vice President. Of the 176 electoral votes, 
there were only 14 against Jefferson. The Federalist Party 
was already very weak, and drew the little life it had from 
New England. 

428. The Barbary Pirates.—Jefferson’s second adminis¬ 
tration was one long struggle to preserve American rights 
against the attacks of other nations, especially France and 
England. During his first administration there had been 
trouble with the Mohammedan states of northern Africa, 
whose deys and beys and pashas, as their rulers were 
called, used to make piratical attacks upon vessels trading 
on the Mediterranean Sea. It had come to be a custom of 
nations to pay a yearly tribute to secure their ships from this 
robbery. So the United States did at first, but our seeming 
weakness tempted the piratical princes to demand more 
and more until Jefferson rebelled and sent in place of gold 

1 The old method of apportioning electors among the states was kept, 
and as even the smallest state has three electors, it may have more 
weight in an election than its population warrants. Presidents have 
more than once been elected by a majority of the electors, although 
having only a minority of the people who voted. 



THE STRUGGLE FOR AMERICAN RIGHTS 255 


some American war vessels, which soon taught the pirates to 
behave themselves. 

429. Affairs in Europe.—But these Mohammedan rulers 
were not alone in scorning American rights. Christian rulers 
also pressed hard upon them. This is explained by the state 
of affairs in Europe. The French Revolution, which caused 
Washington and Adams so much anxiety, had changed its 
character when Napoleon Bonaparte gained control of the 
French Government. At first he was made Consul and then 
Emperor of the French. He entered upon a career of mili¬ 
tary successes without parallel in history. On the Continent 
of Europe he became supreme, but England, protected 
by the British Channel and aided by her powerful navy, 
became just as supreme on the ocean. No French or other 
continental vessel was safe upon the seas, and American 
traders were getting rich carrying to France the products 
she needed, and especially those of her own West Indian 
islands. 

430. “ A Den of Pirates and a Den of Thieves.”—England 
soon claimed that this trade was “ war in disguise ”—that 
Americans were helping France as much as if they fought in 
French armies. So English vessels began to seize American 
vessels engaged in this trade. 1 Napoleon, unable to avenge 
this with his armies, issued a decree shutting British ships 
out of all European ports where his power extended. England 
struck back with an order blockading French ports, and 
Napoleon, without a ship safe upon the sea, decreed a block¬ 
ade of Great Britain. He seized in French ports as prizes 
all American ships which had touched in English ports. 
Then England issued further “ Orders in Council,” as they 
were called, against neutral commerce. As Jefferson wrath- 
fully said, England had become “ a den of pirates, and 
France, a den of thieves.” It seemed as if such disregard of 

1 Within six months over 100 vessels were seized, often by British 
men-of-war cruising up and down the American coast. The most 
vexatious times were from 1806 to 1812. 



256 


GROWTH OF AMERICAN SPIRIT 


our nation’s rights would compel Jefferson to make war 
upon England or France, or perhaps both. 

431. The English Impress American Seamen.—There 

was still another quarrel with England. She had always 
held the doctrine that “ once an Englishman always an 
Englishman,” 1 and that when England was at war she could 
demand the service of her citizens wherever they might be. 
Now she needed every available man for her immense navy, 
but so poor was the pay on British ships, so hard the service, 
and so cruel were many of her captains, that her sailors often 
deserted and came to American ships, where the pay and 
treatment were reputed the best in the world. These men 
the British claimed the right to seize and impress into their 
service. British men-of-war were actually stationed off New 
York Harbor to stop “ Yankee ships ” and to seize men, just 
as likely to be real Americans as deserting British tars, who 
were then forced into a kind of slavery on English ships. It 
is true that Americans often supplied British deserters with 
false papers to prove American citizenship, but that was for 
the two governments to settle. To leave insolent captains to 
take the law into their own hands was to invite war. 

432. Jefferson Seeks Peace.—Jefferson so hated the bar¬ 
barity of war that he tried to devise some other means to 
save America from insult. He sent an unavailing embassy 
to England, and got money from Congress for a flotilla of 
little gunboats to defend the coast. 2 At last the firing upon 
the American frigate Chesapeake by the British vessel Leop¬ 
ard and the seizure from the Chesapeake’s deck of three 


1 Other countries had then the same idea as to their citizens. They 
might come to the United States to live, but still they were subjects 
of the king under whose rule they were born. 

2 Great fun the Federalists had over Jefferson’s toy gunboats that 
could be drawn up on land when not needed and guarded by a single 
sailor. New England did not want war with England, but if she was 
to fight she wanted the “wooden walls of Columbia,” the sides of a 
big sound frigate. 



THE STRUGGLE FOR AMERICAN RIGHTS 


25 ? 


American seamen, in a way most insulting to the national 
dignity, 1 forced Jefferson to a more desperate measure, 
though he still avoided war. 

433. The Embargo, 1807 and 1808.—Because he believed 
that France and England must have American food products 
or starve, Jefferson asked Congress to authorize an Embargo, 
a way of making an enemy suffer which few men had heard of. 
Congress, obedient to Jefferson’s will, passed the Embargo 

Act of 1807. Every 
American vessel was 
thereby forbidden to 
sail out of the home 
ports. Even coasting 
and fishing vessels were 
soon obliged to give 
bonds not to go to foreign 
ports. Commerce was 
tied to Jefferson’s apron 
strings, his enemies cried; 
ships rotted at the 
wharves, it was said; and 
sailors, ropemakers, sail- 
makers, traders, and all who depended upon sea trade, were 
in danger of ruin. From New England there were protests 
and even threats of seceding from the Union. The Embargo 
did not accomplish much, but it was- a choice of evils. It 
did, indeed, annoy England, but did not bring her to terms. 

434. Jefferson Glad to Leave the Burden of Office.— 
Jefferson’s policy of peaceful war was, on the whole, a failure. 
He gave up office in 1809, glad to be relieved of the heavy 

1 Three men had been killed and eighteen wounded by the Leopard's 
broadsides. People were greatly excited—Jefferson ordered all British 
war vessels out of American waters, and forbade any citizen to supply 
them with provisions and water. The British admiral was ordered 
out of our waters by his government, and after a time the American 
seamen were offered back, but the right of impressment was still claimed. 





258 


GROWTH OF AMERICAN SPIRIT 


burden. James Madison and George Clinton were nominated 
by the Republicans in 1808 and elected President and Vice 
President. 

435. Non-intercourse, 1809.—Before Madison entered on 
his administration Congress repealed the Embargo, and 
in its place a Non-intercourse act was passed applying only 
to England and France and the countries immediately 
dependent on them. This helped American commerce some¬ 
what, for our ships could trade with the lands that were still 
independent of Napoleon, and from these states goods found 
their way to other countries. Moreover, when a ship did 
succeed in getting a cargo into a European port, she could 
sell it for so much that traders could afford to lose a vessel 
now and then to English and French cruisers. 

436. Madison’s Efforts for a Treaty Fail.—Madison 
began his administration with rather hopeful prospects. 
Many had confidence in the man whose wisdom had won for 
him the title “ Father of the Constitution,” and who had 
been Secretary of State for eight critical years. He set about 
at once trying to get a favorable treaty from England. All 
went well with the generous English minister, Erskine. So 
good a treaty was drawn up that Madison suspended non¬ 
intercourse with England without waiting for the treaty to 
be ratified, and soon a throng of grain-laden vessels spread 
their sails and turned their prows toward European ports. 

> But the British Government disowned Erskine’s treaty, re¬ 
called him, and sent a stubborn, wrong-headed man named 
Jackson, who wrote home that Madison and his Secretary of 
State, Monroe, were a “ despicable set ” and accused them 
of lying. Of course there was no dealing with him, and non¬ 
intercourse again stopped all trade with England. 

437. The Macon Bill.—It began to be plain, even to the 
most peaceable men, that war with either France or England 
was bound to come. Napoleon devised new decrees to make 
legal the seizure of American vessels, and thousands of dol- 
/ars' worth of American property was confiscated in French 


THE STRUGGLE FOR AMERICAN RIGHTS 259 

ports. America was not strong enough to fight both the 
“ den of thieves ” and the “ den of pirates/' so Congress 
passed a famous bill—the Macon Bill No. 2 (May 1, 1810)— 
which it was hoped would decide which was to be our real 
enemy and which our friend. Intercourse was thereby 
renewed with both Great Britain and France, but if one or 
the other put a stop to the seizure of American ships the 

Congress would declare non-inter¬ 
course with the unfriendly one. 

Napoleon now declared his love 
for the Americans, and with his 
usual cunning ordered that Amer¬ 
ican vessels were not to be seized 
after November 1st—if England 
would do likewise, or if America 
would cause her rights to be re¬ 
spected by England. He had 
really dodged the issue, but Mad¬ 
ison, not a suspicious man, 
thought France had come to 
terms, and he got Congress to 
pass another act for non-inter¬ 
course with Great Britain. France in reality was about as 
bad as before and England felt abused. It was more plain 
than ever that war must come. 

438. Tecumseh and the “ Prophet”; Tippecanoe.—Mean¬ 
while other evils happening in the United States were laid 
at the door of the English. Indian w r ar broke out on the 
northwest frontier, caused partly by the steady advance of 
settlers into the Indiana. Territory. The Indians had sold 
much of their land to our government, and Tecumseh, a 
great leader of the Indians, foresaw that more grants would 
soon be wanted. He and his brother, the “ Prophet,” 
formed the grand plan of an Indian confederation to extend 
along the frontier and bar the Western progress of the white 
man. As a result of this agitation there was some violence 



Tecumseh 



260 


GROWTH OF AMERICAN SPIRIT 


by the Indians. To destroy this confederation the Governor 
of Indiana Territory, William Henry Harrison, gathered an 
army, partly of regular soldiers and partly of frontiersmen. 
They marched to the Indian rallying place, and near the 
Creek Tippecanoe, where it enters the Wabash, the Indians 
attacked and were routed (1811). 

439. A War Party in Congress.—There was a feeling, 
probably in a measure justified, that the Indians were 
counting on English support. This seemed to be one more 
cause for war with England, but the peaceful Madison still 
held back. New men in Congress began now to push him on 
to the struggle he dreaded. Henry Clay, a Kentuckian, 
thirty-four years of age, patriotic, angry at the insults to 
America, and zealous for his country’s honor, became Speaker 
of the House of Representatives, a position which he soon 
made one of great power. 1 Clay and others like him came 
from the Western regions, where there was no ocean com¬ 
merce, and where there were few interests to be hurt by war. 
Such men could think more of honor and less of the losses 
which a war would entail. Another young man of ability 
was John C. Calhoun, just beginning a brilliant career of 
forty years of public life. He came from South Carolina, 
where men met insult with instant challenge. The South as 
well as the restless West was impatient with a dallying policy 
of peace. Young men like these, whose advent marked a 
new generation of American statesmen, became leaders of a 
war party. 

440. The Declaration of War, 1812.—Madison was at last 

induced to say in a message that the British Government was 
really making war on the United States. (1) They had im¬ 
pressed American seamen, and that in a most insulting way. 
(2) English warships stationed along our coast had hurt our 
commerce. (3) English blockades of European ports had 

1 His power of appointing the members of the many committees 
gives the Speaker a power to guide lawmaking by choosing men who 
think his way. 



THE WAR OF 1812 


261 


greatly injured our trade. (4) English intrigues with the 
Western Indians had led to Indian wars on our frontiers. In 
view of these things he advised a declaration of war. All 
Congress needed was the word and (June 18, 1812) war was 
declared. 1 To make war on England, however, was, in fact, 
to join Napoleon, her implacable enemy, so that the world 
witnessed the strange alliance of James Madison, lover of 
peace, and Napoleon Bonaparte, the genius of war. 


Suggested Readings 

Histories: Schouler, Thomas Jefferson. Hart, Formation of the 
Union, 191-206. McMaster, History of the People of the United 
States, III, 240-246, 257-269, 279-307. Wright, Stories of American 
Progress, 121-129. 

Sources: Hart, American History Told by Contemporaries, III, 
Nos. 108, 116-119. Hart, Source Readers, No. Ill, 81-173. 


CHAPTER XXX 
THE WAR OF 1812 

441. Military Strength of England and America.—With 

a popular cry for “Free Trade and Sailors’ Rights” the 
struggle began. Certain important conditions under w T hich 
the war was fought must be remembered. Three thousand 
miles of sea lay between America and the home of her enemy. 
The English had a thousand warships, while our government 
owned a dozen or so. American troops could not under 
such conditions be sent against the islands of Great Britain, 
but Canada, a British possession, lay at our door, seemingly 
open to our attacks. England had nearly three times the 
population of America, but she had, with Napoleon, another 
greater war upon her hands, and, besides, her armies must 

1 Two days before, the British ministry had declared the withdrawal 
of their Orders in Council. A cablegram would have saved a war, but, 
alas! there was no cable, 



262 


GROWTH OF AMERICAN SPIRIT 


come to America to protect Canada. Her armies were better 
trained and her people would stand greater taxation than the 
Americans. Finally, the Americans were not united, for 
Hew England was opposed to war, fearing that it would be 
the ruin of her much-vexed but profitable trade. 

442. Plans of War. —It was the plan of the ambitious 
young leaders in Congress, the “ War Hawks,” to seize 
Canada and, as they said, to dictate an honorable peace at 
Quebec or Halifax. On paper their plan was masterly. It 
was to be a war of action, not of delay. General Hull was to 
take Detroit and then, joining other armies in the East, they 
were all to march in triumph on Montreal and Quebec. We 
can see now how misled were our forefathers, who, without a 
well-drilled army, without supplies, and without roads to 
march over, expected to perform this difficult maneuver as 
if on a parade ground. Of course they failed. 

443. Hull’s Surrender. —Hull, on getting his orders, was 
with his army in the settled part of Ohio. Two hundred 
miles of forest 
lay between him 
and Detroit, and 
he had to cut a 
road as he 
marched. Arriv¬ 
ing in Detroit, he 
crossed to Cana¬ 
da, expecting the 
Canadians to 
flock to his 
standard to gain 
freedom “ from 
the British yoke,” but they did not flock at all. The Indians, 
too, were in league with the British and were valuable allies 
during the whole of the war. In his alarm Hull crossed back 
to Detroit, where the British advanced upon him, and, terrified 
by the increasing dangers, he surrendered without firing a gun. 



Fort Dearborn and its Vicinity in 1812 
This is the site of the present great city of Chicago. 




THE WAR OF 1812 


263 

444. Land Campaign Fails in 1812.—With Hull’s fall, the 
previous surrender of Mackinaw, and the destruction of 
Fort Dearborn 1 by the Indians, Michigan passed into Brit¬ 
ish hands. The Eastern armies at Niagara and in the 
Champlain country accomplished nothing, 2 and the land 
campaign of 1812 was a dismal failure. 

445. Plans for 1813.— In the following year there were 
despeiate attempts to retake Detroit. General Winchester, 
with some brave Kentucky volunteers, advanced as far as 



Field of the Campaigns in the West, War of 1812 


the River Raisin, but General Procter, with British soldiers 
and Indians, beat them, and the Indians brutally treated the 
wounded. General Harrison, the hero of Tippecanoe, was, 
however, able to hold his own in northern Ohio, which the 
British had invaded; and he hoped, if Lake Erie could be 
gained, to retake Detroit. 

446. Perry’s Victory.—To that end American enterprise 
was equal. Commodore Oliver H. Perry, using green timber 

1 Now the site of Chicago. 

2 Bad roads, poor supplies, and worse discipline were the causes of 
failure. 


















264 


GROWTH OF AMERICAN SPIRIT 


from the forest, scraps of iron, wagon tires, hinges, and 
broken tools, built a fleet of vessels at Erie, Pennsjdvania, 
and launched them on the lake. He found the British fleet 
and gave it battle. When his flag¬ 
ship, the Lawrence, was disabled, he 
caused his seamen to row him amidst 
the fury of battle to another vessel, 
and the fight went on. Soon the 
British surrendered (September 10, 

1813), and Perry sent his famous dis- 
patch, “ We have met the enemy and 
they are ours.” American troops 
could now be sent again to Detroit. 

An army under Harrison marched there, took the place, 
crossed into Canada, and defeated a British army on the 
River Thames 1 (October 5), 

447. Other Naval Battles.—Perry’s victory was a severe 
blow to the British pride. And there were other victories. 
It was an English boast that Britannia ruled the waves, and 
that on the seas “ not a sail, but by permission, spreads.” 
Yet the Americans in the first year of the war, with a “ few 
fir-built frigates, manned by a handful of outlaws,” as the 
English papers said, fought a series of sea duels that broke 
the sacred spell of British naval power. The American ship 
Constitution, under Captain Hull, 2 met the Guerriere off the 
coast of Nova Scotia (August, 1812), and in half an hour 
the English frigate was “ a helpless hulk in the trough of a 
heavy sea, rolling the muzzles of her guns under.” From this 
news England received a sensation, said one of her statesmen, 
only “ equaled by the most violent convulsion of nature.” 
In a half hour the Constitution had won the respect of the 
world for the American navy. Nor was that the end. The 
American ship Wasp captured the British brig Frolic in a fight 
which, in a few minutes, left the brig a shattered hulk with 



1 Tecumseh was killed here. 

2 Nephew of the general who surrendered Detroit. 








THE WAR OF 1812 


265 


but one unwounded man on her decks. Soon the Constitution, 
which came to be known as “ Old Ironsides/’ and was now 
under Captain William Bainbridge’s command, captured the 
British frigate Java off the coast of Brazil. The frigate 
United States, under Captain Decatur, took the British ship 
Macedonian. 

448. Fame of the American Navy.—It seemed for a time 
that American ships would prove her best defense, but the 

number of British ships 
was too overwhelming. 
The Chesapeake was cap¬ 
tured by the British 
Shannon, and in the fight 
the American captain, 
Lawrence, who as com¬ 
mander of the Hornet had 
defeated the British sloop 
Peacock in fifteen min¬ 
utes, was beaten and 
mortally wounded (June, 
1813); his brave last 
words still ring in the 
ears of American seamen 
—“ Don’t give up the ship.” This victory brought cheer 
to the British, and it was some comfort to them that in the 
case of most of their late defeats the American ships had 
heavier guns, or a greater tonnage, or more men. But the 
differences were slight, and the British navy had been used 
to giving greater odds than these. The truth was that the 
American ships were the best built of their time; their crews 
were skillful in handling the guns and were the cleverest 
seamen on the ocean. 

449. Privateers Worry England.—When, at last, nearly all 
the American warships 1 were bottled up by the exertions 



1 The Constitution, blockaded for a time, escaped to do fell damage 
and win further victories. The Essex was in the Pacific Ocean taking 














266 


GROWTH OF AMERICAN SPIRIT 


of England’s vast naval force, the vessels owned by private 
individuals still escaped to sea and preyed upon England’s 
immense commerce. Swarming upon the ocean and off the 
British bays and harbors, they captured more than twenty- 
five hundred British ships, * 2 a most vexing loss to the “ mis¬ 
tress of the seas.” One Captain Boyle audaciously pro¬ 
claimed in London a blockade of the whole British coast. 
The terror of English merchants was measured by the high 
freight rates and high insurance on all vessels putting to sea. 
And all this was the work of a “ few petty fly-by-nights,” as 
a London paper said. While this privateering was not fatal 
to British commerce, it was so annoying that the merchant 
class of England began, after a time, to favor peace. 

450. Bad Management of the War.— The patriotic Ameri¬ 
can finds more pleasure in the story of the war upon 
the sea than in the tale of trial and disaster on land. The 
war was not skillfully planned by the President and his 
advisers at Washington, nor were the plans well carried out 
by the generals in the field during the first two years of the 

war. Madison, who was reelected President in' 1812, did 
not choose his Cabinet very wisely; the conduct of the war 

was, therefore, in weak and inefficient hands. The governors 
of New England refused to send militia out of their states at 
the President’s call, and thus the region from which a large 
proportion of the soldiers and money must be drawn was 
openly opposed to the war. Bounties failed to induce men 
to enlist as soldiers for the regular army, and a draft would 
have been resisted. 

451. The End of European Wars Aids the British.—The 

years 1812 and 1813 passed with nothing done by the 

many British prizes and actually living off the enemy, as did Drake in 
Elizabeth’s time. But she was finally overpowered and taken. 

2 Many American ships were seized by British cruisers, and American 
commerce was nearly ruined, but that might have been foreseen; while 
the British losses, on the other hand, were unexpected, and therefore 
the more appalling. 



THE WAR OF 1812 


267 


American armies in New York/ By that time the whole 
situation in Europe had changed. The hitherto unconquered 
Napoleon had invaded Russia, but had been compelled by a 
terrible winter to beat a disastrous retreat, and then to fight 
for two years against overwhelming odds, until he was 
forced to give up all he had gained outside of France and to 
abdicate his imperial office. Many of the veteran soldiers 



that England had kept in Europe were now free for the 
war in America. But before their arrival better officers were 
placed in command of the American armies—General Brown, 
General Macomb, Colonel Winfield Scott, and Colonel 
Ripley—and a few victories were gained. 

452. The War on the Canadian Border.—General Brown 
entered Canada, fought brilliant battles at Chippewa, and 
at Lundy’s Lane captured British guns and resisted charge 
after charge of British veterans, though obliged to give way 

1 An attack was made (1813) on York (now Toronto) and it was 
taken and burned, but no other advantage was gained. 













268 


GROWTH OF AMERICAN SPIRIT 




The Region about Wash¬ 
ington and Baltimore 


at the last. The same bravery was shown by Macomb, when 
a strong army of veterans under 
the British general, Prevost, 
attacked Plattsburg, on the west 
side of Lake Champlain, where 
the American army was in¬ 
trenched. Prevost was re¬ 
pulsed, while McDonough, on 
the lake (September 11, 1814), 
met a much stronger British 
fleet, and within three hours, 
against fearful odds, forced the 
enemy to haul down their flags 
and beat a hasty retreat with 
but a fragment of their fleet. 

This put an end to British inva¬ 
sion by way of Lake Cham¬ 
plain ; but the American invasion of Canada had been pre¬ 
vented, so honors were even. 

453. The Burning of Washington.—Meanwhile, the Brit¬ 
ish had harried the Atlantic coast, blockading the ports and 
plundering the coast towns. Coming up the Potomac they 
landed an army near Washington, and meeting with but 
feeble resistance, entered the city (August, 1814), from which 

the President and all 
the officers of govern¬ 
ment had fled in panic. 
Inrevengefortheburn- 
ing of York (Toronto), 
the invaders under or¬ 
ders burned the Capi¬ 
tol, the White House, 

Fort McHenry and its Vicinity and other P ublic buik1 ' 

ings, and then hur- 

ried away. Both nations regretted the vandalism of their 

soldiers when it was too late. In a like attempt upon Bal- 

















THE WAR OF 1812 


269 


timore the British were bea’ten off with heavy loss. An all- 
night bombardment of Fort McHenry, which protected Bal¬ 
timore, failed, and the “star-spangled banner” was still waving 
in the morning. 1 

454. Andrew Jackson Wins- at New Orleans.—The Brit¬ 
ish now turned to an attack upon New Orleans. If they 
could take that and command the mouth of the Mississippi, 
they might detach the western states from the Union, so eager 
were those states for free navigation of the river. General 
Pakenham, an officer who had fought under Wellington, 2 came 
with an army of 10,000 veterans to the mouth of the Missis¬ 
sippi. They hoped for an easy conquest, but they were met 
by a new American military hero, Andrew Jackson, who had 
crushed the power of the Creek Indians in a battle at Horse¬ 
shoe Bend, on the Alabama. Hearing of the British invasion, 
he had come to New Orleans 1 defense with an army of 5,000 
men, some of whom were Kentucky and Tennessee riflemen. 
At a very narrow place, Jackson built breastworks just behind 
a dry canal, and there awaited the British onslaught. A brave 
and determined attack they made, too, but the deadly fire 
of the American riflemen killed most of their commanders, 
and after terrible losses 3 they retreated, beaten. This 
blood}^ battle, glorious as it was for the Americans, might 
have been prevented had there been an Atlantic cable, for 
two weeks before at Ghent, in Belgium, a treaty had been 
made between England and America to end the war. 

455. The Treaty of Peace.—As early as January, 1814, 
the United States had sent commissioners 4 to make peace 

1 It was his joy on seeing the flag still in place that inspired Francis 
Scott Key to write “The Star-Spangled Banner.” A few weeks later 
the song was omthousands of American lips. 

2 The British general who had just been successful in Spain, and who 
was soon to defeat the great Napoleon at Waterloo. 

3 The Americans were so protected that their loss was small—about 
seventy men. 

4 Henry Clay, John Quincy Adams, Albert Gallatin, James Asheton 
Bayard, and Jonathan Russell—a very strong group of men. 




270 


GROWTH OF AMERICAN SPIRIT 


if possible. It was easy to see why America was tired of the 
war; but England was, too, for British merchants were plead¬ 
ing with their government for relief from the evils of Yankee 
privateering. Moreover, the British were not gaining much 
in America, and to conquer it seemed an unending task. 
With the stopping of the war in Europe, the British need for 
sailors was lessened, and impressment stopped. Since there 
was nothing to fight for, both nations wanted peace. In the 
treaty drawn up at Ghent, nothing was said about the things 
which were the real causes of the war. 1 On those matters 
the agents of the two governments could not agree, but a 
peace, leaving matters as they were before the war, was 
wished by both, and a treaty was finally signed. 

456. The Hartford Convention.—The peace came none 
too soon, for malcontents in New England had at last, in 
1814, brought about a convention at Hartford, where it was 
feared disunion would be advocated. Moderate men took 
the lead, however, who were content with resolutions asking 
for certain amendments to the Constitution which would 
check the powers of the National Government. With these 
resolutions and a proposal to let New England have the 
duties collected in its ports to use for its own defense, deputies 
from the Hartford Convention appeared in Washington 
just as peace was announced. They saw the folly of their 
errand, and hurried home to conceal forever, if possible, 
their connection with the Convention. It had been a 
Federalist affair, and that party then and there received its 
deathblow. As a party it soon ceased to exist, though its 
principles survived, to be embraced by the next strong- 
government party. 

457. Results of the War.— Of the immediate and more 
distant results of the War of 1812, one should make a careful 
appraisement. Some thirty thousand men had been lost and 


1 Impressment was, after all, a thing of the past, and no clause in the 
treaty was needed to put an end to it. England never attempted it 
again. 



THE WESTWARD MOVEMENT 


271 


about two hundred millions of dollars had been spent on 
wasteful war. America’s shipping was almost destroyed and 
trade had suffered great losses, and yet no principle for which 
she had fought was settled. However, the people of America 
had gained in self-respect. They began to think of the 
United States as a nation able to stand alone. They faced 
about and no longer looked over the sea with the old eager 
interest in what England and France were doing. They 
strove after the war to find how best to sell their public 
lands, how to improve their highways of trade, how to pro¬ 
tect the new manufactures which had started up during the 
war, and how to develop the great Western domain toward 
which men were turning. The world’s respect for the United 
States had increased, too, so that writers were warranted 
in calling the struggle “the second War of Independence.” 


Suggested Readings 

Histories: Roosevelt and Lodge, Hero Talcs from American His¬ 
tory. Barnes, The Hero of Erie. Tomlinson, IVar of 1812. Seawell, 
Twelve Great Naval Captains. Roosevelt, Naval War of 1812. 
Scliurz, Henry Clay. Gay, James Madison. Coffin, Building of the 
Nation. Beebe, Four American Naval Heroes. 

Sources: Hart, Source Boole, 218-220. Hart, Source Readers, No. 
Ill, 192-105, 217-255. Hart. American History Told by Contempo¬ 
raries, 111, Nos. 123-129. 


CHAPTER XXXI 

THE WESTWARD MOVEMENT AND THE “MONROE 

DOCTRINE ” 

458. James Monroe and the “Era of Good Feeling.”— 

At the close of the War of 1812 the United States en¬ 
tered upon a period wherein political conflicts between great 
parties were not foremost among historic events. The “ Era 
of Good Feeling” men called the years of 1815-24. James 
Monroe was elected President in 1816 without much ado, 


272 


GROWTH OF AMERICAN SPIRIT 


and four years later he was reelected with but a single 
electoral vote against him. Yet he was not a very great man 
like Washington, whose nobility of character won all men to 
him. He had been a gallant officer of the lower rank in the 
Revolution, a diplomat in France, where he was fortunate 
enough to have had a hand in the Louisiana Purchase, and 
Secretary of State under Madison. He was the choice of 
the Republican Party leaders, Madison and Jefferson; and 
there was as yet no party raised up to take the place of the 
old Federalist Party. 

459. Manufactures and the Tariff.—But if in the years 

just after the war there were no great struggles between 
parties, there were questions of much moment over which 
men fought in Congress. One of these was the question of a 
tariff to protect the American manufactures. We have 
seen how cotton manufactures had begun to grow in New 
England (p. 226). This growth and that of many other 
manufactures was assisted by the Embargo (1807), which 
kept our trading vessels at home and turned the foreign 
ships, laden with clothes and hardware and other daily 
needs of Americans, from our ports. The war also stopped 
most of our trade with England; and, at the same time, the 
need of money to pay our armies made necessary a high 
tariff on goods imported from other countries. It began 
then to pay 1 to make goods in America, because the prices 
could be raised very high before reaching the price which 
European merchants were obliged to ask in order to get back 
the duties they had paid in American ports. Men with 
money began to invest it in factories rather than in ships. 
Mills began to go up where paper, iron products, and cotton 
and woolen goods might be made by a number of workmen 
gathered in one building. 

460. Manufactures Injured by End of War.—All these 
new industries prospered until suddenly the war with 

1 Even though the American laborer had to be paid higher wages 
than the European, and the American machines were cruder. 



THE WESTWARD MOVEMENT 


273 


England ended; there was peace in England, 1 and the 
English began to send over great quantities of goods, selling 
at so low a price as to ruin the sale of American-made goods. 
Mills closed down and a cry went up for a tariff high enough 
to protect American “ infant manufactures.” 

461. Tariff and the South.—Ever since 1789 there had 
been a tariff of some kind upon imported goods, and there 
seemed good reasons for raising it. Congress answered the 
cry for a higher tariff by passing the act of 1816, setting up a 
rate which seems very low to us, but which was thought amply 
protective then. Even South Carolina, a planters’ State, 
with no factories of any kind, voted under Calhoun’s leader¬ 
ship in favor of the tariff, for it was thought cotton manu¬ 
factures might spring up there. The South did not yet realize 
that ignorant negro slaves could not be used in a factory 
with delicate machinery. Randolph, of Virginia, warned 
them of their mistake. “ Will you, as planters,” he asked, 
“ consent to be taxed, in order to hire another man—in the 
North—to set up a spinning jenny? ” 2 

462. The Westward Movement.—Before the tariff began 
to benefit American manufactures, and at the time when 
mills were closing down and throwing men out of work, there 
was a great rush of emigrants to the West. There men 
could secure cheap land 3 and get a start in the world. For 
years swarms of land-hungry people had pushed beyond the 
mountains (p. 229). Kentucky (1792), Tennessee (1796), 
Ohio (1803), and Louisiana (1812) had been admitted to 
the Union, and now, after the war, four states were ad¬ 
mitted in as many years—Indiana (1816), Illinois (1818), 
Mississippi (1819), and Alabama (1819). 

1 After the final defeat of Napoleon at Waterloo in 1815. 

2 Implying that the Southerners could not hope to set up cotton 
mills themselves. 

3 In 1800 Congress voted to divide government lands into small 
tracts and sell at “$2 an acre, i down and 4 years’ time to pay the 
remainder.” 



274 


GROWTH OF AMERICAN SPIRIT 


463. Cause of the Rush to the West.—The close of the 
great European wars caused a great increase in the migration 
from Europe to America. A more important cause for the 
westward movement was hard times in the East, which 
drove unemployed men westward at the same time that the 
old attractions of cheap and fertile lands were drawing them 
hither. Good land in the river bottoms of Kentucky and 
Tennessee, rich timber lands in Ohio, Indiana, and Michigan, 
and the fine prairie lands of Illinois tempted men to settle. 
All was well watered and suited to grazing. 1 In the vicinity 
of Pittsburg, coal and iron mining began to furnish labor for 
men who sought employment. 

464. Three Streams of Migration.—Toward these attrac¬ 
tions of the Mississippi Valley, emigrants were advancing in 
three main streams. The men from the far East used the 
Mohawk Valley, the great natural gateway to the land west 
of the Appalachian system. The Middle State men went 
through southern Pennsylvania by way of Bedford to 
Pittsburg, and thence down the Ohio, or up the Potomac to 
Fort Cumberland, and thence to the Monongahela. The 
Southerners passed from the upper Roanoke to the Holston 
and down the Tennessee, or else turned aside at Cumberland 
Gap into Kentucky. Some of these Southern emigrants went 
to Alabama or Mississippi territory by the easy level country 
south of the Appalachians. 

465. Reasons for East to West Roads.—But by any of 

these routes there were many difficulties—mountains, 
swamps, sands, and unbridged streams—so that after the 
settlers were once over they did not care to encounter such 
trials again. The surplus products of the Western farmers, 
therefore, went down the Western rivers—first by flatboat 
and later by steamboat—into the Mississippi and on to the 


1 The cattle raisers were the first to go to a new region where there 
was good grass, for they could drive their surplus cattle back on the 
hoof to the Eastern markets. 




THE WESTWARD MOVEMENT 275 

Gulf. 1 Thus, merchants on the Atlantic coast lost the 
Western trade. These merchants all became eager to get 
some means of transportation across the mountains cheap 
enough to make it easier to send Western products—potash, 
lumber, hides, and grain—eastward, and to buy Western 


Transporting Freight by Flatboat 

necessities—hardware, clothing, and farm tools—from the 
East. 

Companies of private investors built a few roads at 
first on which they collected tolls from all who used them, but 
these did not suffice, and a great road from east to west was 
proposed which only the National Government appeared 


1 The steamboat at first actually separated the East from the West, 
for men could carry goods on Western rivers down to the Gulf and back 
more cheaply than any wagon could carry them over the Alleghanies 
to the East and the Atlantic ports. 

























276 


GROWTH OF AMERICAN SPIRIT 


rich enough to build. After much discussion in Congress, 
such a road was begun in 1811 at national expense. It began 
at Cumberland on the Potomac, and by 1820 a substantial 
road had been completed as far as Wheeling on the Ohio. 
This National Road became the great highway to the West, 
for at Wheeling travelers could take a steamboat for Pitts¬ 
burg, Cincinnati, St. Louis, or New Orleans. In later years 
this road was carried on nearly to the Mississippi. 

466. Sights on the Trails to the West.— Birkbeck, a traveler 
over this road in 1817 said: “We are seldom out of sight, as 



we travel on this grand track toward the Ohio, of family 
groups behind and before us. ... A small wagon (so light 
that you might almost carry it, yet strong enough to bear a 
good load of bedding, utensils, and provisions, and a swarm 
of young citizens, and to sustain marvelous shocks in its 
passage over these rocky heights) with two small horses, 
sometimes a cow or two, comprises their all; excepting a 
little store of hard-earned money for the land office of the 
district. . . . The wagon has a tilt, or cover, made of a 
sheet, or perhaps a blanket. The family are seen before, 
behind, or within the vehicle according to the road or 
the weather. ... A cart and single horse frequently 
afford the means of transfer, sometimes a horse and a 
pack saddle. Often the back of the poor pilgrim bears all 
his effects, and his wife follows naked-footed.” This picture 
repeated a thousand times tells us vividly the homely story 
of the westward movement. 

















THE WESTWARD MOVEMENT 


277 


467. The Erie Canal.—The great Cumberland Road, 
however, did not cheapen transportation enough between 
East and West. Water connection only, it was thought, 
would be able to rival the Mississippi. De Witt Clinton, of 
New York, saw that a canal connecting Lake Erie and the 
Hudson River would make New York City the commercial 
port of all the region of the Great Lakes and turn the trade 



tswego 

.Fulton 


;6cLest(?: 


Uticj? 


Syracuse 


Buffalo 


Ithaca 


Kingston 


Poughkeepsie 


ewburgh' 


The Erie Canal 


from New Orleans. It was hard to in¬ 
duce the state lawmakers to spend 
millions 1 of dollars on a “big ditch/’ 
as some said with a sneer, but Clinton 
succeeded in winning the interest of 
the people and the respect of the Leg¬ 
islature. So in 1817 the work began, and in 1825 boats 
could pass from near Buffalo to New York City. 

468. Results of Canal Building.—The cost of carrying one 
ton of wheat from Lake Erie to the sea fell from $120 to 
$19. New York City sprang at once to the forefront of 
American cities. 2 The lands of the farmers along the canal 
rose to three times their former value. Pennsylvania and 
states southward made desperate efforts with new roads and 


1 The first cost was seven millions, and repairs cost one hundred 
millions, but the tolls alone paid for it all. 

2 New York’s population in 1820 was 124,000; in 1830 it was 
203,000. 






















278 


GROWTH OF AMERICAN SPIRIT 


canals 1 to regain the Western trade, but New York with its 
Erie Canal was too favorably placed by nature and could not 
be outrivaled. 

469. Missouri Question.—The bettering of the highways 
between East and West helped increase the Western popu- 



A Lock on the Erie Canal 
From an early print. 


lation. Soon after the w T ar men pushed even beyond the 
Mississippi into Missouri and Arkansas. By 1819 the settlers 
in Missouri, who were chiefly Southerners, asked to be 
admitted as a state in the Union. There were so many slave¬ 
holders there that it was known that they would draw up a 
constitution favoring slavery, and in Congress many North¬ 
ern men objected to admitting Missouri as a slave state. 
Southern statesmen favored this, however, and almost for 
the first time it was seen by all that slavery was separated 
from freedom by a geographical line. The alarm “ rang 

1 The Chesapeake and Ohio Canal was a marvel of engineering 
skill, but could not rival the Erie Canal in usefulness. 





















THE WESTWARD MOVEMENT 279 

out,” as Jefferson said, “ like a fire bell in the night,” for 
here was prophecy of war between North and South. 

470. Forces Which Arrayed Slavery against Freedom.— 

How this arraying of freedom against slavery had come about 
we have already seen in part (p. 129). Slavery had existed 
at one time in all the original states, but it was not profitable 
in the North, least of all in New England, and not enough so 
to make it desirable in the Middle States. A farm hand on a 

little New England farm 
must use so many differ¬ 
ent tools, and turn his 
hand from one crop to 
another so frequently, 
that ignorant slave labor 
did not answer. As 
manufacturing grew, the 
slaves were even less use¬ 
ful, and those which were 
not freed were sold to the 
Southern planters. In 
the South, on the great 
cotton, rice, or tobacco 
plantations, there were 
but few tools and few 
changes of the kind of 
labor—just a monoto¬ 
nous repeating of the same motions which the most ignorant 
slave could soon learn. 

471. The Cotton Gin Fastens Slavery on the South.— 

Then the invention of the cotton gin 1 (1793) made profitable 
the raising of short-fiber cotton, which was the only kind 

1 And the slightly earlier invention of machinery for spinning and 
weaving the cotton fiber. When a slave separated the seed from the 
fiber by hand, the long-fibered variety was the only kind that yielded 
a sufficient quantity so that its sale would pay for the labor expended 
and still leave some profit. 



A Cotton Field 











280 


GROWTH OF AMERICAN SPIRIT 


that could be raised on the uplands back from the coast, 
and the cotton-growing area was extended from the seaboard 
far into the interior. Raising cotton with the aid of slaves 
had, by that time, become a habit, and the more cotton 



planting there was the more slaves were wanted. Thus it 
was that slavery gradually disappeared from the Northern 
States, where it did not pay, and with equal steps grew more 
important in the South, where it seemed to enrich the slave¬ 
holders. 

472. The Missouri Compromise.—Of the original thirteen 
states, seven were now free and six slave, 1 while of the nine 
states later admitted, four were free and five slave. The free 
and slave sections thus had an equal representation in the 
Senate. If Missouri, with a constitution allowing slavery, 
were admitted alone, the slave states would have two senators 

1 Some of the states indicated on the map as “Free States” were not 
wholly free at the date given, but “gradual emancipation” was making 
them so. 










THE WESTWARD MOVEMENT 


281 


more than the free states. 1 Moreover, the Louisiana terri¬ 
tory might be carved up into more slave states, for no 
ordinance protected it from slavery as the Ordinance of 
1787 protected the old Northwest. In the midst of the 
controversy, Maine asked to be admitted as a state, and the 
eagerness of some New England members to get statehood 
for her made compromises possible. Missouri was admitted 
as a slave state, but from the rest of the Louisiana Purchase 
north of 36° 30' slavery was forever prohibited. Maine 
came into the Union as a free state. Thus North and South 
patched up a peace, a “ dirty bargain ” as Randolph called 
it, but this was only the first appearance of the great question, 
whether the institution of slavery was to be allowed to expand 
to the western territories. 

473. The Buying of Florida. — While slavery was gaining a 
western extension in Missouri, it also gained a new area in 
Florida. Florida belonged to Spain, 2 but that weak nation 
only half governed it, and it was a place of refuge for runaway 
negroes, hostile or mischievous Indians, and bad white men, 
who not infrequently came back into American territory 
to do some deed of thieving or violence. Cattle were stolen, 
and men and women and children murdered. General Jack- 
son was sent to bring the marauders to terms. This he did 
with his usual thoroughness. He marched into the Spanish 
territory, punished the Indians, seized a Spanish fort (April, 
1818), and even put to death two Englishmen who were 
charged with being spies. Opponents held that in the con¬ 
duct of this expedition Jackson greatly exceeded his rightful 
authority, but it was plain that Spanish rule was hopelessly 
weak. Spain was now ready to sell, and we purchased Florida 

1 The North, with its varied industries to attract the European 
immigrants, had grown faster than the South, and had 105 representa¬ 
tives in the House to 81 slave-state members, so the struggle was for 
power in the Senate. 

2 The United States had taken possession of what was called West 
Florida, claiming it as part of the Louisiana Purchase. 




282 


GROWTH OF AMERICAN SPIRIT 


for five million dollars (1819). It was 1821 before the treaty 
was fully ratified by both nations. 

474. Spain’s Colonies and the “ Holy Alliance.”—Florida 

was one of the last of Spain’s possessions in America. 
All her South and Central American colonies had rebelled, 
one after another. Poor, weak Spain, though unwilling to 
grant the liberties demanded, could not hold the colonies 
whose struggle was strengthened by able leaders like Bolivar 
and San Martin. The kings of four European countries v 
had formed what they called the “ Holy Alliance ” to help 
each other put down rebellions, then so common in Europe. 
They planned to send their united fleets and armies across 
the seas to set up Spain’s power again in her American 
colonies. The people of the United States, however, who had 
themselves rebelled, had great sympathy for the South 
American colonies and wished to recognize their independ¬ 
ence. Besides, our people feared lest sometime European 
armies might be sent here to overthrow our free institutions. 

475. Necessity for Action.— It was plain that we must 
speak out plainly in opposition to the interference of Europe; 
we could not stand by and see the armies of monarchs over¬ 
throw the free governments of the Southern Continent. 
There was another difficulty. Russia was making claims to 
a large portion of the Pacific coast and acting as if the Ameri¬ 
can continent in the west was still open to colonization, as 
it had been two centuries before. This difficulty had also 
to be met. 

476. The Monroe Doctrine.—Urged on by John Quincy 

Adams, who was Monroe’s Secretary of State, the President, 
in December, 1823, said, in his message to Congress, certain 
things which it was hoped the European rulers would read 
and ponder. (1) America is no longer open to colonization 

a warning to Russia; (2) we have not interfered with the 
affairs of Europe and we do not intend to interfere; (3) we do 


1 Russia, Prussia, Austria, and France. 






NEW PARTIES AND THE TARIFF 


283 


not expect Europe to interfere with our affairs on this side 
of the water, and, if the kings of Europe should try to over¬ 
throw the new, free, independent governments of South 
America, we should consider this a mark of “ unfriendly 
disposition toward the United States.” That was much the 
same as saying: “ If you send your troops to South America, 
we will have to join in the fight.” England, it was known, 
felt with us. Russia therefore promised not to colonize 
south of the present southern point of Alaska (54° 50'), and 
the Holy Alliance let Spain's colonies alone. 

At various times before this our statesmen had openly 
said that we wished to keep free from the troubles of Europe 
—remember, for example, Washington’s farewell address, and 
Jefferson’s inaugural address. But the Monroe Doctrine 
vras the complement to the earlier statement, the mate to 
it, one might say—“ If we keep from bothering you, you 
must keep from bothering us.” 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: (Eli Whitney) Sherman Williams, Some Successful 
Americans. Musick, Stories of Missouri. Renolds, Makers of Arkan¬ 
sas History. Hart, Formation of the Union , 233-244. Schurz, Henry 
Clay, I. American Statesmen Series, James Monroe, 152-174. Amer¬ 
ican Statesmen Series, John Quincy Adams, 130-138. Hale, Stories 
of Inventions. Sparks, Expansion of the American People, 211-248. 

Sources: Hart, American History Told by Contemporaries, III, 
Nos. 130, 135-148. Hart, Source Book, 234-240. 


CHAPTER XXXII 
NEW PARTIES AND THE TARIFF 

477. Splitting of Republican Party.—As Monroe’s second 
term neared its close (1824) and the time for presenting new 
candidates approached, the era of political good feeling 
suddenly ended. There was still only one great party—the 
Republican—but it was split into factions, each with its 


284 


GROWTH OF AMERICAN SPIRIT 


leader, and each anxious to keep the old party name. Though 
at least one of the leaders had ideas of government which 
were more like Hamilton’s than like Jefferson’s, yet none 
dared take the ill-omened name of Federalist. Men rallied, 
therefore, about the names of men rather than about the 
names of parties. Those who favored John Quincy Adams 
or Henry Clay, two of the candidates, knew that their 
candidate would favor a liberal construction of the Consti¬ 
tution and the building of roads and canals at the expense of 
the National Government. About Andrew Jackson rallied, 
first, those who admired his military successes or his frontier 
traits, and, secondly, those who thought he would favor 
strict construction of the Constitution and States’ Fights. 

478. The Party Splits on Sectional Lines.—Besides these 
reasons for clinging to one or the other candidate were cer¬ 
tain reasons based on the interests of the section w r here 
a man lived. * The South favored John C. Calhoun, of South 
Carolina, and W. H. Crawford, of Georgia, because they 
would favor Southern interests. Clay and Jackson, too, 
found great favor in the West, simply as heroes of that sec¬ 
tion, in just the way Adams drew many supporters from his 
section, New England. 

479. Sectional Interests.—By the time of the election of 
1824 these sectional interests had become well marked. 
New England, once chiefly interested in commerce and fish¬ 
ing, was coming to use the power of falling water in her short, 
rapid rivers for manufacturing cotton and woolen goods. 
New England, therefore, wanted a tariff w r all to protect her 
infant manufactures. In New York the farmers of the 
Mohawk and Hudson vallej^s, and the merchants of the 
great seaport, New York City, wanted their interests looked 
after. In Pennsylvania, Delaware, and New Jersey, the 
other central states, there was a great area of small farms, 
but there was also a rapidly growing interest in the manu¬ 
facturing of iron. 1 South of the Pennsylvania line there was 

The great coal fields had lust begun to be developed. 



NEW PARTIES AND THE TARIFF 285 

almost no interest but that of the great plantations raising 
tobacco, rice, and cotton. Here, too, there was much dis¬ 
content, because in "V irginia the tobacco fields were worn 
out, their original fertility gone, and in South Carolina the 
price of cotton was falling, due to greatly increasing produc¬ 
tion. 1 Finally, the states west of the mountains and the west¬ 
ern parts of the 
Middle States 
were made up of 
wide-scattered 
farming districts 
needing “ in¬ 
ternal improve¬ 
ments ” — good 
roads through 
the forests, 
canals, and well- 
dredged rivers—• 
to help them carry their products to market. 2 These sec¬ 
tional interests affected national politics for some time to 
come, and were plainly seen in the campaign of 1824. 

480. The Election of 1824.—After much political scheming, 
the election was held. The chosen electors then met in 
their various states and cast their ballots for the candidate 
they were pledged to elect. Ninety-nine voted for Jackson, 
eighty-four for Adams, forty-one for Crawford, and thirty- 
seven for Clay. Since none had received a majority of all the 
votes cast, the choice, as the Constitution provides, was left 
to the House of Representatives. By law the House must 
choose one of the first three candidates, so Clay was therefore 
out of the contest. Since Adams and Clay believed in about 
the same kind of government, Clay’s friends were urged by 
him to vote for Adams. By this means Jackson was de- 

1 See influences of the cotton gin, p. 227. 

2 Since they were too poor to pay for such expensive public works 
themselves, they wanted the general government to pay for them. 







286 


GROWTH OF AMERICAN SPIRIT 


feated, to the great disappointment of himself and the West. 
Jackson’s friends declared that the “ will of the people ” had 
been defied. 1 

481. The “ Corrupt-Bargain ” Cry.—The wrath of Jackson 
and his followers was increased when Adams made Clay his 
Secretary of State. There had been a “ deal/’ they asserted, 
and Clay, they declared, had sold his influence to Adams m 
exchange for the office. This cry, false as it was, ruined 



Map of the Election of 1824 


Adams’ whole administration. It seems a shame that one 
of the best-trained, most able, and most honest men that 
ever held the President’s office was prevented by mere party 
hate from serving his country as he was able. 

482. New Parties.—The people during the years 1824- 
1828 were divided into “ Jackson men” and “Adams 
men.” The fact was that two parties were forming out of 

1 Of course there was no way of knowing whether it had or not. 
Jackson had more votes than anybody else, but if Clay and Crawford 
had not been in the race, all people voting for them might have voted 
for Adams. 

























NEW PARTIES AND THE TARIFF 287 

the old Republican Party, and before the end of Adams' 
term the friends of liberal construction and of the tariff 
began, with Clay as their real leader, to call themselves the 
National Republicans. In later years they came to be known 

as Whigs. In some ways they 
were like the old Federalists, 
but they did not take the high 
tone of Hamilton toward the 
plain people. The strict-con- 
structionists and followers of 
Jackson called themselves Dem¬ 
ocratic Republicans, and ere¬ 
long were commonlv known as 
Democrats. 

483. Manhood Suffrage.— 

Besides this splitting of the 
Republican Party into two 
parties, other great political 
changes took place in this era 
(1820-30). One of them had 
begun in Jefferson’s time, and 
was practically complete by 
the close of Adams’ term (1828). This was the change 
from the old property or tax qualifications to “ manhood 
suffrage ”—a man was to vote simply because he was a man. 
In Washington’s time most of the eastern states had allowed 
no one to vote who did not own a certain amount of property 
or pay a certain amount of rent. But the new western 
states did not thus restrict the right to vote; and the eastern 
states, in part from Western examole. gradually adopted 
manhood suffrage. 

484. “ Down with King Caucus.”—The Jacksonian de¬ 
mocracy, for so we may call the political spirit which 
seemed to rule political action after 1820, also began to 
fight for another reform—the right of the people to name 
their own candidates for office. Since 1800, nominations 





288 


GROWTH OF AMERICAN SPIRIT 


for the presidency had been made by the congressional 
caucus. The members of Congress belonging to each party 
would meet, decide upon a candidate, and announce his name 
to the country. Thus the people had nothing to say as to 
whom they would have for a candidate. Only great and 
successful politicians and men in favor with congressmen 
could hope for office. A man of the people, like Andrew 
Jackson, had had no chance. Thus there arose a cry, 
“ Down with King Caucus,” and the western states led in 
the overthrow. There men had grown self-reliant in their 
struggle to develop a new country, and they had no patience 
with airs of superiority. One man was no better than another, 
they held, and they wanted a President who was a man of the 
people. In 1824 Crawford was nominated by the congres¬ 
sional caucus; but that was the last one ever held for this 
purpose. State legislatures and state conventions nominated 
for a time, and then the national nomination convention 
came into use (1832). 

485. “Adams Who Can Write, and Jackson Who Can 
Fight.”—In 1828 Adams and Jackson were again candidates. 
The hardy frontier warrior, “ Old Hickory,” as men 
loved to call Jackson, had lived in a log cabin, had fought 
the Indians, was the “ Hero of New Orleans,” and had led 
the simple life of the backwoods. He was one of the plain 
people, and their hearts were set on his election, especially 
since his failure in 1824. 1 Against him was John Quincy 
Adams, a man with few friends, too high-minded and 
honorable to use his office of President to increase the number 
of politicians who would work for him. 2 For the first time 
in our history the great mass of the people began to take 
interest in a campaign. “ Jackson is one of us,” said many 
a man who before this had let politics alone, and he huzzaed 

1 A couplet of the time shows the sentiment. It ran: “John Quincy 
Adams who can write, and Andrew Jackson who can fight.” 

. 2 He would not remove his enemies from office, or appoint his friends, 
or make promises. 



NEW PARTIES AND THE TARIFF 


289 


himself hoarse over the fact that Adams did not get a vote 
south of the Potomac or west of the Alleghanies, and that 
Jackson was elected. 

486. The Tariff Controversies.—Rough and uncultured 
as Andrew Jackson was, he was strong of will and had a 
warm place in the people’s hearts. Before Adams’ term 
ended and Jackson’s began, a great contest had begun in 
Congress, which was soon to try the strength of the National 
Government in its relations with a state; and it was well that 
a man with the confidence of the people was President when 
the crisis came. The cause of this struggle was the tariff. 

487. The “ Tariff of Abominations.”—The very first 
Congress (1789) had laid a low-tariff duty, but its main 
purpose was to raise money to run the government. After 
the War of 1812, however, there had been, as we have seen, 
an appeal to Congress for a tariff high enough to keep out 
European goods, and thus leave the home market to the 
new American manufactures. Congress passed such an act, 
but it did not make the rate high enough, and in 1824 a 
new law, urged by Henry Clay, 1 was passed, raising the 
duties still higher. By this time the Southern statesmen 
opposed the high tariff, because there were no manufactures 
in the South, and protection did the South no good. Four 
years later still another act was passed. It was so bad in 
some ways that it came to be known as The “ Tariff of 
Abominations.” It pleased nobody. 

488. North and South Disagree About the Tariff.—Against 
this ill-made tariff bill there came protests from many 
quarters, but most important was that from John C. Calhoun, 
representing the interests of South Carolina. 2 The pro¬ 
tective tariff law was unconstitutional, he said, and such 
a law might be nullified by a state. In other words, the 

1 He argued for what he called the “American system,” i. e., a plan 
to make America self-supporting. 

2 Randolph had declared that the bill was to “ rob and plunder one 
half of the Union (the Southern) for the benefit of the residue.” 



290 GROWTH OF AMERICAN SPIRIT 

state might forbid the United States customs officers to 
collect the tariff within the state limits. If that were true, 
there would be an end to all effective government at Wash* 
ington, and we should go back to the troublous times of the 
Confederation period. By the time Andrew Jackson was 
inaugurated, all thinking men were worried and fearful of 
this menace to the strength of the National Government. 


Suggested Readings 

Histories: (H. Clay) Williams, Some Successful Americans. Hart, 
Formation of the Union, 246-251, 260-262. Wilson, Division and 
Reunion, 17-18. American Statesmen Series, Henry Clay, John 
Quincy Adams. Wright, Industrial Evolution of the United States , 
144-152. Sparks, Men Who Made the Ration. 


CHAPTER XXXIII 
THE COUNTRY IN 1830 

489. New Men and New Enterprises.—In order that we 
may understand the events of the administration of President 
Jackson, we need to take a general view of the country about 
1830, and to compare it with the United States of Washing¬ 
ton’s time. We shall find it a different country, ruled by 
different men. The places of Washington, Hamilton, Adams, 
and Jefferson had been taken by Jackson, Clay, Calhoun, 
and Webster. We must notice that the two statesmen who 
most influenced the people—Jackson and Clay—came from 
west of the Appalachian Mountains. If the West did not 
actually rule the East, the East no longer determined the 
destinies of the West. Moreover, the bustle and hurry of 
the West had seized upon everybody. The sleepy times, 
when America had gazed lazily toward Europe, had fully 
changed, and America was proud—too proud, as travelers 
agreed—of her own enterprise and prosperity. A new race 
seemed to have spread through all the wide domain. 


THE COUNTRY IN 1830 


291 


490. Growth of Territory and Population.—In 1789 there 
were about four millions of people in the United States, the 
great majority dwelling within about sixty miles of the At¬ 
lantic seashore. By 1830 there were thirteen millions of 
people, who spread from the Atlantic seaboard, with its man¬ 
ufactures and commerce, into the land beyond the Missis¬ 
sippi. Even far away in 
the Rocky Mountains, 
the fur traders mingled 
with the Indians. The 
traveler toward the west, 
leaving the old seacoast 
states, passed through a 
vast area of farm and 
grazing land, where far¬ 
mer and ranchman strove 
for a living and dreamed 
of riches. Since the 
earliest adventurer had 
pushed beyond the Alle- 
ghanies, the forest farms 
with their log cabins 

Distribution of Population in 1830 had become villages with 

frame houses, and here 
and there a modest town had become a thriving city. The 
Indians and the forests had given way, they and other 
barriers receding ever farther toward the west. The buy¬ 
ing of Louisiana and Florida had more than doubled the 
size of the United States, but population had more than 
kept pace with the expanding territory. 1 

491. Growth of Cities and Its Results.—In this growth 
the cities of the East had especially shared. In New York 
City, the thirty-three thousand inhabitants who might have 
seen Washington inaugurated, had become by 1830 over 



1 In 1789 the United States embraced 800,000 square miles, but in 
1830 the area was 2,000,000 square miles. See map facing p. 250. 





















292 


GROWTH OF AMERICAN SPIRIT 


two hundred thousand. It was now seen that with her 
magnificent harbor, and with the Hudson River and the 
Erie Canal offering lines of connection with the interior, 
New York City was to be one of the great cities of the world. 
In other places good water power had caused the rise of 
large manufacturing towns whither laboring men flocked. 
The large size of some of these cities made the problem of 
feeding and warming large numbers of people living in small 
areas a very important one. Wood, burned in open fire¬ 
places, became too dear, and gave way to the hard coal, or 
anthracite, lately found in Pennsylvania; and this needed 
a new kind of stove in which it might be burned. From coal, 
too, gas was made, and 
then the streets were 
lighted, and people that 
could afford it gave up the 
tallow dip or the sperm- 
oil lamp. In the larger 
cities men were forced 
to live so far from their An Early Horse Car 

business that omnibus 1 

lines and then horse cars 2 running on iron tracks came 
into use. 

492. Marvelous Growth of the West.—While the East 
was showing some growth, especially in the cities, a more 
astonishing growth of population was seen in the western 
states, and in the western parts of eastern states like Vir¬ 
ginia, New York, and Pennsylvania. Kentucky, Tennessee, 
and Ohio had, in the ten years preceding 1830, added a million 
and a half people to the previous population. Indiana and 
Illinois had more than doubled their population. In a 
little over a generation Ohio’s u fresh, untouched, unbounded 
• . . wilderness ” had become a populous state with more 
people than Massachusetts and Connecticut combined. The 

1 Omnibus is the Latin word meaning “for all” or “for everybody.” 

2 First used in New York in 1832 











































THE COUNTRY IN 1830 


293 


West now had more votes in the House of Representa¬ 
tives than any other section, and it was plain that its political 
leaders and their ideals would compel attention if not actually 
rule. Only a few years before, the forests of the West had 
opened their gates to the poor, the discontented, and the 
downtrodden, and now their children were prepared to gov¬ 
ern the nation. 1 

493. Life on the Frontier.—What had changed these men 
of the “ Western World/’ and made them different from the 
Americans of the Atlantic seaboard, was the life they led on 

the rough frontier. First 
they had experienced the 
trying journey through 
forests, over mountains, 
and down streams to the 
lonely spot in the woods 
-—the one hundred and 
sixty acres which they 
had “taken up” at the 
government land office. 2 
There, in a hastily built 
“half-faced camp,” or 
open shed of poles, 3 the family lived until trees could be cut 
for the log cabin, the universal home of the backwoodsman. 
Meantime, the trees were “girdled” by cutting an encircling 
notch which stopped the sap and killed the foliage. Then, 
in ground thus laid open to the sun, the corn and potatoes 

1 Presidents Jackson, Harrison, Polk, Taylor, Lincoln, Johnson, 
Grant, Hayes, Garfield, Harrison, McKinley, and Taft have come from 
the country beyond the Appalachians—“the West.” 

2 The government had at first sold large tracts of land to companies, 
which then sold to actual settlers. Then for a time the government 
sold small tracts to settlers and trusted them until they could pay, but 
about 1820 the wiser plan was adopted of selling at a low price—$1.25 
per acre—for cash to actual settlers. 

3 In such a camp lived Lincoln, the future President, when his father 
left Kentucky and, crossing the Ohio on a raft, came to Indiana. 



A Frontier Log Cabin 







294 


GROWTH OF AMERICAN SPIRIT 


and wheat were planted. So far were the settlers from 
any place where furniture, tools, or food were sold, that, ex¬ 
cept for the few things brought with them, all must be made 
from the forest. Brooms 
were made of corn husks; 
chairs and tables were hewn 
from the trees. 

494. Men Become Self- 
Dependent.—These condi¬ 
tions made men inventive, 
resourceful, and independ¬ 
ent. On the rough frontier 
no one was rich and few 
were very poor; every one 
was judged by his success, 
and not by his family tree. 

A shrewd man, who chose 
land wisely, was often fol¬ 
lowed by others; he might 
then cut his land into town 
lots, name the town for him¬ 
self, 1 and, as the owner of the first store or mill, become 
the foremost man of the village. Men like this were the 
leaders of the frontier. 

495. The Need for Railroads.—With this rising, active, 
and thriving society west of the Alleghany Mountains, the 
merchants and manufacturers of the East grew ever more 
eager for close relations. To get their trade New York had 
built the Erie Canal, and Pennsylvania had tried in vain to 
rival this “big ditch” with almost impossible canal schemes 
and an inclined or “portage” railroad to climb over the 
mountains. It was little wonder, therefore, that the states 
outrivaled by New York turned eagerly to consider the 



Homemade Implements of the 
Frontiersman 


1 Look on the map and see how many western towns are evidently 
named after men who first dwelt there. 























THE COUNTRY IN 1830 


295 



Method of Transporting Freight Before 
the Time of the Railroad 


idea of railroads with wagons drawn by a steam engine, like 
the one George Stephenson had lately made in England. 1 

496. The Earliest Railroads.—Already there had been some 
use of wooden rails, over which wagons with flanged wheels 

were drawn by 
horses or driven 
by sails. In 1827 
Massachusetts, 
eager to get some 
of the benefits of 
the Erie Canal, 
planned a rail¬ 
road from the seaport of Boston to Albany, on the Hudson 
River. This was used by every one who had a wagon with 
flang’ed wheels. In 1828 the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad 
was begun. As Charles Carroll, the last living signer of the 
Declaration of Independence, opened the work by driving 
the first spade into the ground, he said: “I consider this 
among the most important acts of my life, second only to 
that of signing the Declaration of Independence.” Could he 
have foreseen the immense influence the railroad and the 
locomotive were to have 
on our nation, binding 
it together and making 
its unity possible, he need 
not have hesitated to say 
that it was the greatest 
event in which he had 
taken a prominent part. 

497. Steam Locomo¬ 
tives. — Steam locomo¬ 
tives were first success¬ 
fully used in South Carolina in 1831. But even after that 
there was much doubt as to the railroad’s success at 

1 As early as 1814 he had made his first engine, “Puffing Billy/' but 
not till 1825 could he be said to have fully succeeded. 





One of the First Steam Engines 










296 


GROWTH OF AMERICAN SPIRIT 


first; steam engines went well only on level ground, and 
many improvements were needed to make the roads safe. 



Railway Travel in 1831 


Year after year, however, trains went a little faster; locomo¬ 
tives, rails, and roadbeds became a little better and travel 


BOSTON AND WORCESTER RAIL ROAD.? 



T HE Passenger Cars will continue lo run daily from the 
Drpol near Washington street, to Newton, al 6 and 
10 o’clock, A.M.and at 34 o'clock, P. M. and 
Returning, leave Newion at 7 and a quarter past II, AM. 
and a quarter before 5, P.M. 

Tickets for the passage either way may be had at the 
Ticket Office, No.CI7, Washington street ; price 3cents 
each ;aud lor the return passage, of the Master of the Cars, 
Newton. 

By order oPthe President and Directors, 
a 29 epistf F. A WILLI AMS, Clerk. 


Advertisement of the First Passenger Train in 
Massachusetts, May, 1834 


became easier and safer. 1 In 1834 the first long railroad 
was completed. It extended one hundred and thirty-seven 

1 By 1831 a speed of fifteen miles an hour had been reached. When 
a line was opened from Albany to Schenectady, there was a dinner with 
speeches; among the sentiments applauded was this: “The Buffalo 
Railroad—may we soon breakfast in Utica, dine in Rochester, and 
sup with our friends on Lake Erie.” 






















































THE COUNTRY IN 1830 


297 


miles, from Charleston, S. C., to a town near Augusta, 
Ga. Men then came to understand those living far from 
them, and the West was gradually bound to the East. 
The customs and ways of thinking of the one became 
known to the other, and both were better for this. 

498. Social Reforms.—-In these days, too, came many 
social reforms. Men felt more kindly toward those who 
were unfortunate. Free schools sprang up everywhere; 
asylums and homes were built for homeless old folks, for the 
insane, and for orphan children. Imprisonment for debt 
was partly abolished. Even criminals were looked upon with 
more charity. Prisons were cleansed of their dirt and filth, 
and better food and care were given the prisoners. No 
longer were they branded on cheek and forehead to disgrace 
them, and the pillory and stocks were done away with. 
Instead of being kept in idleness and whipped for the vicious 
habits that came from this, prisoners were set to work learn¬ 
ing trades which made an honest life possible. In many ways 
people became more humane, and more practical. 

499. Schools and Colleges.— With the coming of more 
leisure to the people of the United States, more time was 
given to learning and culture. The schools of the land grew 
steadily better. In the West, where there were large tracts 
of public lands, the government gave one-thirty-sixth part 
in each state to support education. 1 In the larger towns 
high schools were added to the elementary grades, and then 
normal schools were set up to prepare teachers to meet the 
growing demand. In the East the colleges improved their 
metnods, began teaching the sciences as well as literature 
and the arts, and drew many more students than of old. 


1 One section in each township was given for education. Nothing 
in our history is more important than this beginning and the growth 
of free public education. In 1837, with the admission of Michigan into 
the Union, came also plans for a state wide system of education, in¬ 
cluding the common school and the university, a system now common in 
all the great West. 



298 


GROWTH OF AMERICAN SPIRIT 


600. “Who Reads an American Book?”—There arose 
also a real American literature. No longer could the English 
wit ask, “ Who reads an American book? ” The practical 
literature of the older days—like Franklin’s “ Poor Richard’s 
Almanac,” and the political pamphlets, such as “ The Fed¬ 
eralist”—was supplemented by genuine pure literature. 
Cooper’s Indian and scout stories, Irving’s legends and his 
humorous history of New York, and Bryant’s simple poetry 
began to please not only Americans but Englishmen as well. 
In Jackson’s time some of America’s greatest literary men 
began to delight all true lovers of books. Longfellow and Poe, 
Emerson and Holmes, Lowell and Hawthorne were writ¬ 
ing the most charming verse and prose, while Bancroft, 
Motley, and Prescott began to write history which was 
worthy of the scholars of any land. In Jackson’s adminis¬ 
tration, therefore, Americans began to be proud of being 
Americans and to feel sufficient unto themselves. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: Howells, Stories of Ohio. Thomson, Stories of Indiana. 
Wright, Stories of American Progress, 179-194. 

Sources: Hart, American History Told by Contemporaries, III, 
Nos. 165-167, 155. 



Threshing Grain with a Flail 



VI 

PERIOD OF THE RISE OF POLITICAL POWER 
IN THE WEST AND THE ANTI¬ 
SLAVERY MOVEMENT 

CHAPTER XXXIV 

JACKSON AND THE BANKS.—THE NULLIFICATION 

TROUBLE 

501. Jackson’s Inauguration.—When Andrew Jackson 
came to Washington for his inauguration, the plain people, 
especially those of the West, felt that they were at last really 
in possession of the government. “ A monstrous crowd 
swept down on Washington to see the ceremony. They 
really seemed to think that the country was saved from some 
dreadful danger.” The mob upset the pails of orange punch, 
broke the glasses, and in their muddy boots stood upon the 
“ damask-covered chairs to see the old hero.” Adams, 
the “ aristocrat,” was turned out, and Jackson, the “man 
of the people,” was welcomed in. 

502. Jackson, the Typical Westerner.— There was, indeed, 
something lovable about this tall and spare man, with his 
great mane of hair and his courteous, military bearing. 
Honest and upright, frank and cordial, his ways were 
simple, and he always strove to please the people, among 
whom his life was spent and to whose aid he had come when 
danger threatened them. Like them, he quarreled and 
fought duels, loved his friends and hated his enemies. 
Unfortunately, too, he was sometimes under the influence of 
men who were none too good and knew how to inflame his 
prejudices; the} r could smoke and chat with him, and get 
more of their own way than the men of his Cabinet. 

603. Removals from Office.—In the crowd which came 
to the Capitol were thousands of seekers after office, cam- 

299 


300 


THE WEST AND ANTISLAVERY 


paign “workers,” asking for reward. Jackson could not 
say, “ No,” to his friends, and only by turning out those 
already in office could he satisfy the demand. Within a year 
over seven hundred men were turned out, many of them 
faithful and honest, and with long training for their work. 
In their places Jackson put those who had fought for his 
election, no matter whether they were fitted for the office 
or not. His close friends worked with him “ to scrape the 



A Cartoon of Jackson’s Administration 

Jackson clearing the kitchen. 1 

barnacles clean off the ship of state,” as one said. “ To the 
victors belong the spoils,” they answered to those who pro¬ 
tested. 

504. The “ Spoils System” and The “ Gerrymander.”— 

The “ Spoils System ” was already well established in some 

1 This cartoon depicts Jackson’^ violent methods for which his admin¬ 
istration became notorious. All men who opposed him were regarded 
by him as his personal enemies. 




























ANDREW JACKSON’S ADMINISTRATION 


301 


of the states. Nor was this the only evil which had gained 
a place in state politics. In Massachusetts, in 1812, the 
Republicans were so afraid that the Federalists would have 
a majority in the next state senate 1 * that they, while they 
held their power, created by law some new senatorial dis¬ 
tricts which were so oddly formed as to unite places with 
Federal majorities to places with still larger Republican 
majorities and thus save the district to the Republicans. 

This act was signed by Gov¬ 
ernor Gerry. It is said that 
the artist Stuart added claws, 
wings, and a beak to a map of 
such a district and asked an 
editor standing by how that 
would do for a salamander. 
“ Better say a Gerrymander,’ 7 
answered the editor. What¬ 
ever the origin of the name, 
the trick drew attention in 
other states, and was imitated 
not only then, but is used to 
this day. In Jackson’s day it was freely used along with 
the “Spoils System” to bolster up the party in power. 

605. The Tariff Vexes the South. —Though the removal of 
so many faithful public servants by Jackson caused some 
debate in Congress, yet the one subject which would not 
down was the tariff. By 1829 the South—both on the 
seaboard and in the interior—had become one great cottan¬ 
growing region. The North, too, in addition to its commerce 
and manufacturing, was given to agriculture, but it raised 
not one great staple like cotton, but varied products, wheat, 
corn, vegetables, and fruits. Moreover, all Southern labor 
was slave, and unsuited to manufacturing. The tariff, 



1 The Federalists were sure to elect the governor and a majority in the 

House of Representatives. 





302 


THE WEST AND ANTISLAVERY 


protecting manufactures as it did, while it pleased the 
North, sorely annoyed the South, lest it should bring them 
“ poverty and utter desolation.” Her statesmen seized upon 
the first excuse to attack the North—especially New England 
—for its sectional greed in this matter of protection. 

506. The Debate Between Webster and Hayne. — In 
1830 there was a great debate in the Senate. Daniel Webster 
led the Union side and Robert 
Y. Hayne, of South Carolina, 
defended the State Rights idea. 

Hayne stated in a brilliant 
speech the arguments of Cal¬ 
houn, 1 and to him Webster 
replied before an audience “so 
excited, so eager, and so sym¬ 
pathetic ” that he was spurred 
to the greatest effort of his life. 2 
From that day he was the 
greatest of American orators. 

On this occasion men “listened 
as to one inspired,” and went 
away convinced that Webster 
was “ by far the greatest man 
in Congress.” Never had the American people been so 
awakened to the glory of the Union; Webster’s beautiful 
sentiments rang in men’s ears long years after his great 
oration closed with the words “ Liberty and Union, now 
and forever, one and inseparable.” 

507. Arguments of Hayne and Webster. —Against Hayne’s 
declaration that the states were sovereign, or all-powerful, 

1 That the states were sovereign, and nullification, constitutional. 

s Webster was very impressive at all times. “Good Heavens,” said 
a famous Englishman, “he is a small cathedral by himself!” George 
Ticknor said on one occasion, “ I never was so excited by public speaking 
in my life. Three or four times I thought my temples would burst with 
the gush of blood. ” 




ANDREW JACKSON’S ADMINISTRATION 303 

and that the National Government was a mere creature of the 
states, Webster declared that the Constitution was “ the 
peopled constitution, the people’s government; made by 
the people, and answerable to the people.” The people, he 
declared, have made the Constitution “ the supreme law.” 
Not a state, but the Supreme Court of the United States 
alone, could declare a national law unconstitutional. Whether 
Hayne or Webster was right theoretically, men argue to this 
day, but this much was certain—that the people of the 
North had begun to think as Webster thought, and year by 
year thereafter their faith grew until the “ Union idea ” 
ruled north of the Mason and Dixon line. 

508. The Supreme Court. —It was of great advantage to 
Webster that he could call attention to the Supreme Court 
as the final judge, for the Court stood high in the respect and 
affection of the people. The feeling was in part due to the 
great work of John Marshall, the Chief Justice (1801-35), 
who was a very able man, one of the greatest judges that the 
world has ever seen. 

509. Nullification in South Carolina. —But the Southern 
States, especially those along the coast, were having hard 
times, probably the result of the increase in production and 
the fall in the price of cotton. 1 These hard times were laid 
wholly at the door of the protective tariff, which doubtless 
did bear more heavily upon the agricultural South than upon 
the varied industries of the North. When, therefore, in 1832, 
Congress passed a new tariff act, South Carolina determined 
to nullify it. A state convention declared the act null and 
void, and the state prepared to prevent the enforcement of the 
act within its limits. 

Jackson had had some little sympathy with State Rights, 
but when the doctrine was developed by Calhoun and 

1 In 1811, 80,000,000 lbs.; in 1821, 127,000,000 lbs.; in 1826, 333,- 
000,000 lbs. 

The price was in 1816, 30 cts.; in 1820, 17 cts.; in 1824, 14 J cts.; in 
1827, 9 cts. 



304 


THE WEST AND ANTISLAVERY 


Hayne, and when they tried to put it into practice, his 
natural patriotism and common sense revolted. u General 
Dale,” he said to a friend, “ if this thing goes on, our 
county will be like a bag of meal with both ends open. 
Pick it up in the middle or either end, and it will run out. I 
must tie the bag and save the country.” When he turned to 
Congress for more power in the matter they passed the 
“ Force Bill,” or “ Bloody Bill,” as its enemies called it, 
giving Jackson the power he wished. At the same time, 
moreover, Henry Clay came forward with a compromise 
tariff which met favor in the South. Congress adopted it, 
and thus war was averted. South Carolina had its way, but 
it learned a lesson from Jackson’s firmness which it was some 
time in forgetting. 

510. The Election of 1832. —While this struggle over 
nullification and the tariff was going on, Jackson was encour¬ 
aged in the stand he had taken by the outcome of the elec¬ 
tion of 1832. The National Republicans met in Baltimore 
and named as their candidate for the presidency, Henry 
Clay, the idolized orator and defender of the protective 
tariff. 1 2 Jackson’s followers also held a convention, naming 
him and Van Buren as their candidates. They won an 
overwhelming victory which Jackson looked upon as proof 
that the people approved all he had done. 

511. The Bank of the United States. —One of the things 
which Jackson had been doing was trying to destroy the 
United States Bank, which had been chartered in 1816 as 
the only bank in the country in which the government held 
stock and with which it deposited its money. The state 
banks did not like it; they were jealous of it.; they called it 
a “ hydra-headed foreign shaving shop.” 2 Especially in 

1 Nominating conventions were now held (see p. 288). A platform 
later (May, 1832) adopted by the convention of the “young men” of 
the party was the first national party platform. 

2 Because much of the bank stock was owned by Englishmen, and it 
discounted bills—“ shaving ” off a little as its pay for running the risk*. 



ANDREW JACKSON’S ADMINISTRATION 


305 


the West, where Andrew Jackson had always lived, it was 
hated because it hurt the “ wild-cat ” banks—state banks 
which issued paper money regardless of their ability to redeem 
it in gold. So Jackson, who had always heard “ the Bank ” 
denounced as a “ moneyed monopoly,” was hostile to it, 
especially, perhaps, because Clay defended it. 

512. Jackson Destroys the Bank.— Jackson, his critics 
said, disliked the Bank because its stockholders and managers 
were political enemies. He determined to destroy it, 
and, as a result, thousands of enemies of the Bank looked 
upon Jackson as a sort of democratic St. George killing the 
financial dragon. “ Champion of the j^ellow boys,” they 
called him, the driver out of “ Old Nick’s Money,” 2 or 
et Clay’s rags,” as they called the Bank’s currency. When 
Congress passed a law renewing the Bank’s charter which 
would expire in 1836, Jackson vetoed the law. Then hap¬ 
pened the election of 1832, and Jackson’s great victory. 
At once he took means to have the United States deposits 
withdrawn from the Bank as fast as they were needed to 
pay the nation’s expenses. There were then no vaults be¬ 
longing to the government for storing the money; Jackson, 
therefore, ordered the government revenues thereafter to be 
placed in certain state banks, called by his critics “ pet 
banks.” 

513. Harmful Results of “Pet Banks.” —Jackson’s policy 
of putting the public money in “ pet banks ”—many of 
which were in the West—had the bad effect of increasing 
the wild speculations in Western lands and the mad schemes 
for improvements which were already a real danger to sound 
business. Men with no money in hand borrowed recklessly 
of “ pet banks ” to buy land whose rapid rise in value might 
make them rich. Companies and states borrowed from the 

1 Jackson “trembled for the purity of our elections” while this bank 
continued to exist. “Yes,” he said, “ I had rather be in the desert of 
Sahara dying of thirst than drink from such a fountain of corruption.” 

8 Nicholas Biddle, president of the United States Bank. 



306 


THE WEST AND ANTISLAVERY 


banks to build railroads and canals which ran through 
trackless wilds between places which some time might become 
thriving towns. Plans were made for cities in the woods or 
on the unbroken prairie. Into these schemes the “ pet 
banks ” poured the government’s money or their own paper 
bills, and each day 
they made smoother 
the road to speculation 
and final ruin. 

514. Distribution of 
Surplus and Specie 
Payment. —The gov¬ 
ernment lands went 
like hot cakes, 1 and the 
money paid therefor, 
together with the great 
sums taken in at the 
ports for tariff duties, 
paid off the national 
debt with a rush, and 
a great surplus began 
to pile up in the “ pet 
banks ” where the na¬ 
tion’s money was de¬ 
posited. When the 
nation had too much 
money, the natural 
thing to do was to stop 
collecting tariff duties, but nobody dared meddle with the com¬ 
promise tariff for fear of stirring up sectional hate again, so a 
curious plan was invented to get rid of the gathering surplus. 
Congress decided that the surplus should be loaned to the 
states. On this unwise plan three payments were made. The 

1 Immigrants were coming into the country and many of them went 
West to buy lands. In 1820-29 over 110,000 people came in, and in the 
next ten years 500,000. See diagram, p. 338. 



A Contemporary Cartoon of Jackson 



























































JACKSONIAN DEMOCRATS GIVE WAY TO WHIGS 307 


money for this distribution was drawn from the “ pet banks,” 
which then had to stop lending money and ask repayment. 
The borrowers could not pay, and ruin menaced the West. 
Just then Jackson issued his famous “ Specie Circular ” 
to the United States land officers, ordering them to accept 
only gold and silver 1 2 in payment for public land. This 
discredited the paper-money issues of hundreds of banks, 
and final ruin fell upon them and their customers. But 
Jackson’s “ reign/’ as his opponents called his presidential 
term, was over before the deluge came. In 1836 Van 
Buren, “the mistletoe politician,” as his enemies called him, 
was elected President largely through Jackson’s influence. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: McMaster, Daniel Webster. Wilson, Division and Re¬ 
union. Schulz, Henry Clay, II. Brown, Andrew Jackson. (Political 
Depravity of the Fathers) McMaster, With the Fathers. Frost, Old 
Hickory. Barton, Four American Patriots. 

Sources: Hart, American History Told by Contemporaries, III, 
Nos. 158-163. 


CHAPTER XXXV 

JACKSONIAN DEMOCRATS GIVE WAY TO THE WHIGS 

615. “ Panic of 1837.” —It was a bad time to be President 
of the United States, for the banks failed, the mills and mines 
closed, and thousands of men and women, thrown out of 
work, could not buy food, when as a result of poor harvests 
(1835-36) the price of flour rose to eleven dollars per barrel, 
and bread riots terrified the cities; and everybody turned to 
the government and cried for help. Though the “ Panic 
of 1837 ” was partly due to Jackson’s financial follies, yet 


1 And certain land certificates, but not bank paper money. 

2 Because he was nourished by the sap of the hickory tree, the Jack- 
son emblem. 



308 


THE WEST AND ANTISLAVERY 


the people, because of their wild speculations, were much to 
blame, and it was right that they should suffer and learn. 
So Van Buren very wisely decided, and he turned to the 
problem of how to save the government itself from losses. 

516. The “ Little Magician ” and the Independent Treas¬ 
ury Bill.— The great question was what to do with the 
government money. Clay and Webster wanted a new United 
States Bank, but Van Buren was too firm a disciple of 
Jackson to listen to such a scheme. In spite of the ill opinion 
held by Van Buren’s enemies—who called him the “ Little 
Magician ” because of his clever political maneuvers, and 
the “ Kinderhook 1 Fox ” because of his slyness—the Presi¬ 
dent was really a sensible statesman, and he wanted to set 
up what is known as an “ Independent Treasury.” In other 
words he proposed that the government should keep its 
own money in vaults, instead of putting it into banks. 
Many people had no patience with this plan, and it was not 
until Van Buren’s term was nearly ended (1840) that the 
Independent Treasury bill was passed. 2 

517. “Democrats” and “Whigs.” —During the long 
opposition of Clay and Webster, leaders of the National 
Republicans, to Jackson and his favorite, Van Buren, the 
two parties had changed their names. The Jackson party, 
or Democratic Republicans, dropped the last part of their 
name and became plain Democrats. The National Repub¬ 
licans, while opposing what they called the tyranny of 
Jackson, the nation’s executive, had the happy thought to 
call themselves Whigs, after the party in England which 
for generations had opposed the growth of the powers of 
their executive, and perhaps, too, after the patriot party of 
the Revolution. So, by taking the popular name Whig, 
and by nominating in 1840 a popular Western hero, General 


1 Kinderhook was Van Buren’s home in New York. 

2 Although the act was repealed for a time it was again passed, and 
this system is in use to-day. 



JACKSONIAN DEMOCRATS GIVE WAY TO WHIGS 309 



William Henry Harrison, 1 the Whigs fairly outbid the 
Democratic Party for the favor of the “ common people.” 
As Harrison’s running mate in the presidential race the 

Whigs chose John Tyler, of Virginia. 

518. The “Log Cabin Campaign” 
Won by “Old Tip.” —Though Van 
Buren had really been a wise Presi¬ 
dent, he had had the misfortune to 
tAf Af|¥| % rule during hard times, and was un- 
wf Mil SI justly blamed for not making them 

better. In the campaign of 1840, 
therefore, after Van Buren was renom¬ 
inated by his party, there arose a cry, 
“ Turn out little Van.” Then a Demo¬ 
cratic paper made the mistake of jeer¬ 
ing at Plarrison’s simple life and tastes. 2 
He would, it sneered, be more at home 
11 in a log cabin, drinking hard cider 
and skinning coons, than living in the 
White House.” At once the Whigs 
made the “ log cabin ” their party 
emblem, placed log cabins on wheels 
or built them on the village commons 
all over the land; they set up a cider 
barrel at the entrance, and nailed a 
coon skin on the door. This made a 
great appeal to the farmers, and at that time a majority 
of Americans were farm bred. Monster mass meetings of 
fifty to a hundred thousand people gathered to hear speeches 
denouncing the rich Van Buren, the “ little aristocrat,” 



A Badge Worn Dur¬ 
ing the Log Cabin 
Campaign 


1 He had been defeated for President in 1836, but the times had 
changed. 

2 William Henry Harrison was the son of Benjamin Harrison, of Vir¬ 
ginia, one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. The 
son moved West, gained renown in the battle of Tippecanoe, and set¬ 
tled among the Western people. 
















































310 


THE WEST AND ANTISLAVERY 


who gave great parties and who had never known honest 
toil. * 1 When the canvassing ended, the log-cabin candidate 
and “ Tyler too ” were elected, getting nearly all of the 
electoral votes. 2 

519. Harrison Dies and Tyler Takes His Place. —But 

“ Old Tip ” did not “ guard the ship ” very long. A horde 
of office seekers swooped down on Washington to share the 
spoils taken from the Democratic Party, which now lost 
control of the government for the first time since Jackson 
set up the “ Spoils System.” The good-hearted President 
was worn out with the pleas of office seekers, and in weakened 
health he caught cold and died, just one month after his 
inauguration. John Tyler, the first Vice President thus to 
succeed the elected President, at once took the oath of office. 
In principles and sympathies he was a Democrat 3 and the 
Whigs, who nominated him to get the Southern vote for 
their ticket, had never dreamed that he would become 
President. 

520. Tyler Versus the Whigs. —The Whigs had hoped 
while they controlled the government to use the nation's 
money for internal improvements, canals and roads, to 
protect manufactures by a high tariff and to set up again 
the United States Bank, but here was Tyler, their President 
by an act of Providence, opposed to them all. He refused 

" * i ** > - ■ ■ % 

1 A favorite song was about 

“ The ball that’s rolling on for Tippecanoe and Tyler too; 

And with them we will beat little Van, Van, 

Van: Van, oh, he is a used up man, 

And with them we will beat little Van.” 

3 A taunting song, 

“Farewell, dear Van, 

You’re not our man; 

To guard the ship 
We’ll try old Tip,” 

expressed the popular joy when Van Buren left the White House. 

3 He had not taken sides with the Democrats because he disliked 
Jackson and his measures. 



JACKSONIAN DEMOCRATS GIVE WAY TO WHIGS 311 

to sign a new bill for a Bank of the United States, and 
he vetoed two tariff bills. At last the Whig leaders 
and Tyler agreed upon a new tariff, the Act of 1842, but 
patience was exhausted, and the members of Tyler’s Cabinet 
resigned—except Webster, who kept his place that he might 
finish a treaty of great moment for the peaceful relations of 
the United States and England. 

521 0 Webster-Ashburton Treaty. —The two governments 
were as near war as they ever had been since the War of 
1812. Ever since the close of the Revolution (1783) there 
had been a dispute over the boundary line between Maine 
and New Brunswick. In 1838 Maine tried to seize the 
disputed lands by military force (the Aroostook War). 
This and other troubles seriously menaced the peace of the 
two nations. The cooler and wiser heads, however, arranged 
to have Daniel Webster, our Secretary of State, and Lord 
Ashburton, a well-disposed Englishman, meet and settle 
the dispute. This they did, giving a little and taking a 
little, until they arranged the boundary as it is to-day. 
They agreed also to return criminals escaping from one 
country to the other, and to aid each other in checking the 
slave trade, which still existed on the west coast of Africa. 
Thus important questions were settled, not by war but by 
peaceful agreement. 

522. Tyler and Whigs Quarrel. —Tyler and the Whig 

leaders in Congress quarreled so much during the rest of his 
term 1 that little lawmaking was done. But now a question 
was coming forward, by the side of which quarrels over 
tariffs and banks looked small indeed—the question of annex¬ 
ing Texas, a part of the empire of Mexico—the question of 
adding more slave territory to the Union. This became a 
burning issue. In order to understand it fully we must go 
back a few years and study the growth of a new movement— 

1 At the end of two years the Democratic Party secured a majority 
in the House of Representatives, so there was a Whig Senate, a Demo¬ 
cratic House, and a President who was neither Whig nor Democrat. 



312 THE WEST AND ANTISLAVERY 

the antislavery movement—which by Tyler’s time had taken 
everybody’s attention, and never ceased its work until the 
outcome of a great war set all the slaves free. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: Wilson, Division and Reunion. McMaster, Webster. 
Schurz, Henry Clay , II. American Statesmen Series, Van Buren. 


CHAPTER XXXYI 
SLAVERY AND ANTISLAVERY 

523. Slavery as Viewed in Olden Times. —Slavery grew 

up in the colonies, as you will remember, simply because 
it seemed the only way to get enough labor where so much 
was needed. Little heed was given to the evils of slavery by 
most men, and only here and there a thoughtful man opposed 
the growing institution. Richard Baxter (1678) wrote: 
“ To go as pirates and catch up poor negroes, and to make 
them slaves and sell them is one of the worst kinds of thiev¬ 
ery in the world but not many agreed with him. It was 
chiefly among the Quakers that there was objection to 
slavery, for they held that “ liberty was the natural right of 
all men equally.” 

524. Slavery and “The Rights of Man.” —When we 

leave the colonial times and reach the American Revolution 
we find that men began to see how inconsistent slavery was 
with the ideas of human rights. Several Northern states 
before 1800, abolished slavery or gradually freed the slaves. 
While many wise statesmen in the South—Jefferson and 
Madison and others—saw the evils of slavery, yet the 
slaves were too useful and were too large a part of the 
Southern wealth to be readily given up. In the Continental 
Congress the Southern statesmen united with the Northern 
to keep slavery out of the Northwest Territory, 1 and in the 


1 By the Ordinance of 1787, reenacted in 1789 by the new Congress. 



SLAVERY AND ANTISLAVERY 


313 


Constitutional Convention the Southern men agreed to 
allow the new Congress to stop the slave trade after twenty 
years. In 1807, a law prohibiting the slave trade after 
January 1, 1808, was passed by both Northern and 
Southern votes. But the cotton gin and resulting growth 
and extension of cotton raising was making the negro so 
valuable, that soon the South began to oppose all laws 
against slavery. 

525. Slavery Pushes Westward. —The rich cotton planters 
who had lived near the Atlantic seacoast began, soon after 

1800, to push into the 
back country, taking 
their slaves with them 
to the higher lands 
of the interior. Then 
the poor farmers of 
the back country, who 
had no slaves, and 
could not get along 
where slaves were, 
sold their lands to 
the rich planters and 
moved at first into 
Kentucky and Tennessee, and later even into Ohio, Indiana, 
and Illinois. While the Northern frontiersmen were spread¬ 
ing north of the Ohio and on westward, the Southern poor 
emigrant began to cut out clearings along the rivers that 
flowed to the Gulf and to the lower Mississippi. After 1820 
they pushed even farther on into Texas, where grants of land 
were obtained from the Mexican Government. Close behind 
these log-cabin pioneers came the slaveholding planter in his 
family carriage, with his train of slaves and hunting dogs. 
Again, the poor farmer had to give way, unable to refuse the 
higher prices offered for his lands, and he was pushed back from 
the more fertile lands in the “black belt” to the pine hills and 
barrens on either side. The kid-gloved planter and the horny- 



Slave Quarters on a Southern 
Plantation 








314 


THE WEST AND ANTISLAVERY 


handed pioneers could not mingle. Thus, a region in the cen¬ 
ter of the Gulf States and along the Lower Mississippi had 
been added to the cotton-planting and slaveholding area. 

526. Slavery Becomes More Cruel.—With the growth of 
this new western slave land, the old life of the slaves changed. 
The kind old masters common in Virginia, who lived among 
their slaves and who grew too fond of them to abuse them, 
were not so often found. The sort of master who was willing 
to live amidst the rude conditions in the West was there 
to make money, to drive his slaves with lash and threat. 
Owners sometimes never saw their slaves, but hired an over¬ 
seer, who, all too often, was cruel-hearted and bent on money¬ 
making. Then, too, the old, outworn plantations of Virginia 
began to sell slaves to the planters of Alabama and Missis¬ 
sippi, and one of the worst sides of slavery came much into 
view—the breaking up of families and selling of husband and 
wife and children to different masters. 

527. Early Ideas as to Freeing the Slaves.—As the 
character of slavery grew worse, there arose, in the South 
itself, men who agitated against slaveholding. They had 
little effect, however, and it was claimed that they only 
made the negroes dangerous by putting the idea of freedom 
into their heads. If masters were induced to free their slaves, 
the freedmen, it was argued, became a menace to society. 
A few slave uprisings, 1 which seemed to result from anti¬ 
slavery preaching, made the Southern planters very angry 
with all agitators. Almost the only scheme for freeing the 
negroes which the planters would tolerate was that of the 
Colonization Society. In 1822 a settlement, later called 
Liberia, was made on the coast of Africa. To this settle¬ 
ment free negroes were sent at the expense of the society, 
but the cost was so great, and the process of ridding America 
of negroes so slow, that few kept any faith in it. 


1 The Gabriel insurrection in Virginia in 1800, the Vesey plot in 1822 
in Charleston, and the Nat Turner rebellion in Virginia in 1831. 



SLAVERY AND ANTISLAVERY 


315 


528. Beginnings of the Movement Against Slavery.— 

It was evident that the forces which would destroy slavery 
must come from the North, where slaves were not a paying 
investment. The Northern Quakers had long been opposed 
to slavery; but as slavery gradually disappeared from the 
Northern States, the early antislavery societies gradually 



Facsimile of a Heading of Garrison’s “Liberator” 


grew less active and by 1829 had almost ceased to exist. In 
1821, however, Benjamin Lundy began to preach and plead 
for freedom. “Within a few months/’ wrote a friend, “he 
has traveled about twenty-four hundred miles, of which 
upward of sixteen hundred were performed on foot! During 
this time he has held nearly fifty public meetings.” At last 
he made a convert of William Lloyd Garrison, and in him 
the great cause of antislavery found its leader. 

529. William Lloyd Garrison.—In 1831 Garrison founded 
The Liberator. He declared his purpose to free the slaves: 
“I will be as harsh as truth and as uncompromising as 
justice. On this subject I do not wish to think, or speak, or 
write with moderation. I am in earnest—I will not equivo¬ 
cate—I will not retreat a single inch—and I will he 
heard.” He soon got attention by his very unfairness. 
He never could see but one side to the question. To him the 
slaveholder was a robber and a murderer. He even refused 
to acknowledge the National Government because it allowed 
slavery, and he denounced the Constitution as “a covenant 
















316 


THE WEST AND ANTISLAVERY 



with death and an agreement with hell/' i. e., with slavery, 
A friend saw in his beautiful countenance and clear eye 
that resolute spirit which makes the martyr. An enemy saw 
in his work “ a crime as great as that of poisoning the waters 
of life to a whole community.” Friend and enemy, however, 
had to listen to him. 

530. An Era of Reform.—Yet even Garrison might have 
been unable to arouse men’s consciences had it not been 
that his work began at a 
time when reform was 
abroad in the land. 

Public sympathy had 
already been awakened 
in regard to the poor 
and even the criminal. 

During the twenties and 
thirties most of the 
states passed laws to re¬ 
lease poor debtors who 
could pay nothing, but 
who had been sent to 
prison for debts sometimes only of a few dollars. Brutal treat¬ 
ment of prisoners in loathsome prisons was beginning to be 
intolerable. It began to be seen that an effort to reform was 
better than a spirit of vengeance. The first modern prison 
was finished about 1830 at Philadelphia. Here were separate 
cells instead of a common prison room where a hardened 
criminal might corrupt men guilty of some slight offenses and 
who might easily be led to better ways. More attention 
began to be paid to the causes of crime, and a great temper¬ 
ance reform movement was afoot. Thousands joined the 
“ Washington societies ” and stopped using liquors, though 
their use had before been almost the universal custom. 

531. Various Kinds of Reforms.—The insane—to whose 
cause Dorothea Dix was especially devoted—and the blind, 
and the dumb began to receive attention. Hospitals, 


First Modern Prison in the United 
States 

Erected at Philadelphia in 1830. 

















SLAVERY AND ANTISLAVERY 


317 


asylums, and institutions began to be established for their 
care. Even the heathen were the objects of sympathy, 
and mission societies were formed for the first time. The 
education of the common people got greater attention, and 
under the leadership of Horace Mann —“ who preached the 
gospel of the alphabet and sang the praises of the primer all 
the day long ”—better schoolhouses, books, and teachers 
began to be provided. State universities, too, began to care 
for higher education. Michigan hardly began her career as 
a state (1837) before she founded a university. About 1830, 
under the leadership of Frances Wright, a strong movement 
began for “ Women’s Rights.” 

532. Reform Societies.—Certain companies of men and 
women began also to try social reforms by experiments in 
what was called community life. 1 “ Not a leading man but 
has a draft of a new community in his waistcoat pocket,” 
wrote Emerson. Robert Owen, a Scotchman, founded on the 
lower Wabash, in Indiana, “ The New Harmony Community 
of Equality.” Here they sought to end sin and poverty by 
bringing up the children of the community in ideal sur¬ 
roundings. They soon failed to get along peacefully, as 
did many other societies who tried to ape them. Another 
more aristocratic society was the “ Brook Farm ” community 
in New England, in which Hawthorne, Ripley, Alcott, and 
others tried to live ideal lives—to “ go to Heaven in a 
swing,” as Emerson described it. 

533. Mormonism.— Besides these communities there were 
many new religious sects, of which the most remarkable 
was that of the Mormons, founded by Joseph Smith, of 
Palmyra, New York (1829). Smith published the Book of 
Mormon, an inspired book, as he declared, and soon drew 
after him thousands of followers. Their practices brought 
persecution upon them, and they retreated gradually 

1 That is, without separate homes for each family, but with large 
common lodgings and eating houses. 




318 


THE WEST AND ANTISLAVERY 


westward 1 until in 1846 they went to the arid region of 
Utah. 

534. Antislavery Literature.—As a result of all this agi¬ 
tation of the public mind and the growing belief that a 
man was responsible for 
his neighbors’ sins, there 
was a public conscience 
to which the Abolition¬ 
ists might appeal. One 
after another strong men 
grew interested in the 
movement. The poet 
Whittier began to give 
his talents to the cause 
and stirred men’s hearts 
with verses like the 
“Slave Mother’s Fare¬ 
well.” 2 Longfellow, too, 
lent a poet’s aid, and 
most effective of all, Wen¬ 
dell Phillips appealed with a “silver tongue” to the great 
principles of human liberty. 

535. Antislavery Arguments.—The antislavery writers and 
orators argued that slavery kept the negro debased; that to 
keep a negro a slave he was kept ignorant. The Southern 
laws proved this, for they forbade his education, lest he be¬ 
come dangerous. Yet he was a man in spite of his black skin, 
Garrison said, and was entitled to the same rights as a white 
man. Abolitionists pointed out the natural tendency to 
cruelty, and the bad effect on negro morals of breaking up 

1 To Kirtland, Ohio, then to Missouri, then to Nauvoo, Ill., and 
finally to Utah. 

2 “Gone, gone—sold and gone, 

To the rice fields dank and lone, 

From Virginia’s hills and waters; 

Woe is me, my stolen daughters.” 



The Mormon Temple at Nauvoo, III. 
From an early print. 







































SLAVERY AND ANTISLAVERY 


319 


families by selling husband, wife, or child to another master. 
Slavery was bad even for the master, it was urged, for it put 
the master under dreadful temptations when it gave him the 
power of life and death and torture. It was even bad econ¬ 
omy, for slaves were wasteful, destroyed tools, and in spite of 
the lash did only two thirds as much work as freemen. 

536. Defense of Slavery.—The answer of the defenders of 
slavery was that when the negro, who in body and mind 
was inferior to the white man, was brought from Africa, 
where for a thousand years he had made no progress, he 
was saved from a barbarous life with few comforts, fraught 
with constant dangers, and subject to hideous superstitions. 
Once in America, if left free and to his own caprice, he would 
soon die, for he did not know how to use tools, or to do steady 
work, or to cure himself if ill. The slave was happiest when 
fed and cared for, they asserted. Slavery was a good 
thing, it was said, for a country ruled by the people, because 
it set the master free from toil and gave him time to perform 
his political duties. 1 At least, the slavery defenders would con¬ 
clude, the institution is now fastened upon the South, and 
all agitation against it is perilous to us; our slaves may be 
stirred up to rise and murder us all. 

537. Persecution of Abolitionists.—When the Southern 
planters cried out against the Abolitionist, many at the 
North sympathized with them. An antislavery meeting in 
Boston (1835) was broken up; Garrison was led through the 
streets with a rope about his body, and the mob tried to kill 
him. Elijah Lovejoy, an Abolition editor in Illinois (1837), 
was murdered by a mob. Negro schools were broken up 
and the buildings destroyed. All this persecution only 
drew attention to the cause, and the Abolition movement 

' grew as the martyrs gained public sympathy. 

1 They also quoted the Scriptures in defense of slavery. “ Cursed 
be Canaan, a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren. ” Abra¬ 
ham bought and held slaves. St. Paul sent a fugitive slave home to his 
master. 




320 


THE WEST AND ANTISLAVERY 


538. Congress and Antislavery.—Fearful of the effect 
of abolitionist teaching on the slaves, the South called upon 
Congress to forbid the post offices to carry The Liberator or 
other Abolition papers in the mails. They went further and 
tried to get Congress to refuse to receive petitions sent by 
Abolition societies urging the abolition of slavery in the Dis¬ 
trict of Columbia. Though the right of petition had ever 
been a sacred right of freemen, and was secured to Americans 
by an amendment to the Constitution, yet “ gag resolutions ” 
were passed which kept petitions from being discussed in 
Congress or printed. 

John Quincy Adams, “ the old man eloquent,” as he 
came to be called, made a noble fight, one of the noblest 
in our history, against these tyrannous rules. Petitions 
poured in and the brave old man kept the matter 
before Congress until at last it gave way. In this way many 
who had hitherto taken no interest in the antislavery move¬ 
ment were now enlisted in its defense, because they were 
interested in freedom of the press and right of petition. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: (J. Q. Adams) Lodge and Roosevelt, Eero Tales from 
American History. Wilson, Division and Reunion. Morse, Life of 
John Quincy Adams, 243-307. Garrison, William Lloyd Garrison. 
Rhodes, History of the United States, I. 

Sources: Hart, American History Told by Contemporaries, III, 
Nos. 170, 171, 173, 174-178, 179, 183. Hart, Source Book, 248-263. 


CHAPTER XXXVII 
TEXAS AND THE MEXICAN WAR 

539. Texas Secedes from Mexico.—While the North and the 
South were becoming more and more set by the ears because of 
the slavery question, there arose an opportunity to annex a 
large territory sure to become a cotton-raising, slaveholding 
region. The old Spanish possessions in the southwest, 


TEXAS AND THE MEXICAN WAR 


321 




which had won independence from Spain in 1821, had set 
up as a new republic, the United States of Mexico. Texas, 
one of the provinces of Mexico, lying along our southwest 

border, had early at¬ 
tracted Americans. 
When Moses Austin 
got a large land grant 
therein from Mexico, 
many Americans set¬ 
tled there. They did 
not get along well 
with Mexico, and 

The Alamo ^ t e^ went 

into open rebellion. 1 
At last (1836) the Mexicans under Santa Anna, then Presi¬ 
dent, were defeated at San Jacinto by the Texans under Sam 
Houston, a settler from Tennessee. The Texans set up a 
republic, and, as was natural, where so many of the settlers 
were Americans, they sought admis¬ 
sion to the American Union. 

540. Shall Texas Be Annexed?— 

From the beginning of Texan indepen¬ 
dence (1836) this question of annexa¬ 
tion was now and again considered; 
but the matter was not seriously 
taken up till after Tyler came to the 
presidential chair. He favored annex¬ 
ation. In the campaign of 1844 the 
Texan question was widely discussed. 

641. Early History of Oregon.—Another territorial ques¬ 
tion arose, too, side by side with the Texan question. It was 
the question whether Great Britain or the United States 


The Lone Star Flag 
of Texas 


1 At first they were unsuccessful, and a small band of Texans in an old 
fort, known as the “Alamo,” were brutally massacred. From that 
time the cry of the Texans was, “Remember the Alamo.” 

















322 


THE WEST AND ANTISLAVERY 


should permanently hold the Oregon territory, a name given 
to the vast region west of the Rocky Mountain crest and lying 
between Spanish or Mexican California and the Russian 
Alaska. Its northern border was 54° 40'. Both England 
and America claimed ownership, and, since 1818, had held it 
in joint occupation. For many years explorers, trappers, 
and fur traders had been the sole white inhabitants, but of 
late, missionaries to the Indians, like the famous Marcus 
Whitman, had induced settlers to immigrate thither. From 
western Missouri, with long trains of wagons, immigrants 
had set out across the plains, reaching Oregon only after 
fearful hardships. 

642. Election of 1844; “Reannexation of Texas” and 
“ 54-40 or Fight.”—At the same time, therefore, that the 
Democrats nominated James K. Polk, of Tennessee, they 
declared in their platform that “ our title to the whole of 
Oregon is clear,” and they urged the “ reannexation of 
Texas.” 1 The Whig Party nominated Henry Clay, but in 
their platform said nothing about Texas. Clay should wisely 
have kept silent also, especially as he was not decided either 
way. But the cries of the Democrats of the South, “ Texas 
or Disunion,” and of the North, “ The Whole of Oregon or 
None,” “ Fifty-four Forty or Fight,” seemed to be gaining 
voters, and Clay wrote a letter which the newspapers her¬ 
alded the length and breadth of the land. He would annex 
Texas “ without dishonor, without war,” with “ common 
consent,” and “ upon just and fair terms.” 2 This was 
fatal, for many Whigs, opposed to slavery and to the annexa¬ 
tion of Texas, now voted for James G. Birney, candidate of a 
new party, the Liberty Party. This party had few votes, but 
in New York it got just enough to prevent Clay’s getting the 

1 Their idea being that we once bought Texas (1803) from Napoleon. 
The fact is that in 1819, when we bought Florida from Spain, we gave 
up any claim we might have had. 

2 One of Clay’s followers, bitterly disappointed, declared that he 
hoped the next Whig candidate would not know how to read or write. 



TEXAS AND THE MEXICAN WAR 323 

electoral vote of the state. Losing that, he lost the election, 
and Polk was chosen President. 

643. Texas Annexed by Joint Resolution.—Tyler, who 
would still be President until March 4, 1845, took the 
election as a decision of the people for annexation. He 
pressed Congress to act. A treaty would not do, for that 
needed a two-thirds vote of the Senate, so a new method was 
taken. The two houses passed a joint resolution for the 
admission of Texas (March 1, 1845). 

544.. War Declared on Mexico.— After the coming of 
Polk to the presidency, Texas accepted the terms of admis¬ 
sion and in December, 1845, was finally declared admitted. 
Mexico protested, for she still claimed the new state as her 
province. She also disputed the southern boundary of 
Texas. A United States army had been hurried to Texas. 
Polk ordered General Taylor to the banks of the Rio Grande 
in the territory claimed by Mexico. There the Mexicans 
attacked, and Polk, reporting the affair to Congress, declared, 
“ Mexico has invaded our territory and shed American 
blood on American soil.” With blind patriotism, Congress 
voted money to make war on Mexico. 1 

545. Three Important Campaigns.—There were three 
main features of the Mexican War. First, there was General 
Taylor’s march across the Rio Grande toward Monterey. 
Second, General Scott began a campaign at Vera Cruz, 
which ended in the capture of the City of Mexico. Finally, 
California was seized by the American armies. 

546. Taylor’s Brilliant Victories.—Taylor had two pur¬ 
poses: he would defend the Rio Grande so that the Mexi- 

1 There is still room for question as to whether we were right in fight¬ 
ing Mexico, and scholars differ. Our patience was certainly sorely tried, 
but a little fairness, a little more patience, and a little more generosity 
might have made war unnecessary. Polk's method of blaming Mexico 
reminds one of the soldier who came into camp with a dead sheep over 
his shoulder, though foraging was forbidden. “No sheep can bite me 
and live,” he said. 



324 


THE WEST AND ANTISLAVERY 


cans could not attack Texas, and then he would advance 
into Mexico, carrying terror to the Mexicans. He beat their 
armies at Palo Alto and Resaco de la Palma (May 8, 9, 
1846), and seized Matamoros on the Mexican side of the 
river. Delaying there to make full preparation, he pushed 
on at last toward Monterey, strongly fortified and defended 



Field of the War with Mexico 


by a large Mexican force. After three days of constant 
fighting from street to street and house to house, the city 
was surrendered. In the winter following, a large part of 
Taylor’s army was ordered to the aid of General Scott, and 
the Mexicans under Santa Anna saw their chance. At Buena 
Vista they attacked Taylor with four times his numbers (Feb¬ 
ruary, 1847), but were beaten back with terrible slaughter. 
This was Taylor’s last battle in a campaign of unusual glory. 







TEXAS AND THE MEXICAN WAR 


325 


547. Scott Takes the City of Mexico.—General Win¬ 
field Scott, meanwhile, had captured, with the aid of the 
navy, the castle and city of Vera Cruz, on the eastern 
coast, and, like Cortes three hundred or more years 
before, started westward to seize the ancient capital of the 
Aztecs. Though constantly opposed by several times his 
numbers and though disease thinned his ranks, Scott pushed 
grimly on. He stormed the Cerro Gordo heights one day 
(April 18th), took Jalapa the next, and Perote three days 
later. Then with slower advance he pressed on until, August 
10th, he saw the City of Mexico. On every side of it were 
marshes, and only over narrow causeways could it be reached. 
One after another the strongholds were captured, and with 
but six thousand fighting men remaining, Scott entered the 
City of Mexico in triumph (September 14th), after one of 
the most remarkable marches in the world’s history. 

548. Kearney and Fremont Take California.—Far to the 
north, meanwhile, Colonel Stephen W. Kearney was making 
a march which was to add New Mexico to American territory. 
Leaving Fort Leavenworth, on the Missouri River, he 
crossed to the Arkansas and pushed southwest to Santa F6, 
which he took August 18, 1846. Pressing on to California 
—a name given the Mexican territory on the Pacific coast— 
he found that already in the hands of his countrymen. 
There had been a number of American settlers in this region 
who, at the first word of war with Mexico, set up a republic. 1 
The new state was supported by Commodore Stockton, who 
appeared with a small fleet on the Pacific coast, and by 
John C. Fremont, “ The Pathfinder,” who had led an 
exploring expedition thither in 1845, and who was now on 
hand with a small but effective military force. 

549. Treaty of Peace with Mexico.—When the treaty 
of peace was made (1848) at the little town of Guadalupe 


1 The “Bear Republic,” as it was called, because of the flag they 
raised with the image of a grizzly bear. 



326 


THE WEST AND ANTISLAVERY 



Hidalgo, Mexico was forced to cede the great northern 
region and, of course, to give up her claim to Texas or 
any part of it. 1 Though Mexico was at our mercy, the 
American Government had enough regard for the world’s 
opinion to pay $15,000,000 in cash, and, furthermore, to 
agree to pay to Amer¬ 
ican citizens $3,500,- 
000, which they 
claimed from Mexico 
for damages and sums 
owed them by Mexi¬ 
cans. Because of a dis¬ 
pute as to the southern 
bounds of the cession, 
the United States later 
(1853) paid $10,000,- 
000 for a strip of 
land between the Rio 
Grande and Colorado 
rivers. This we call 
the Gadsden Pur¬ 
chase, aft or James 
Gadsden, who made 
the agreement. 

550. Oregon Se¬ 
cured by Treaty.— 

While President Polk The Oregon Country 

Was fighting theMexi- Showing the claims of Great Britain and the 
can War, to make good United States and the lines established by 
,v ii /? i • , various treaties. 

the pledge oi his party 

to annex Texas, he was compelled to settle the Oregon 
matter also. The British Government was ready to fight 


1 The land acquired in 1848 and the land taken into the Union as 
Texas, together cover an area as large as several European states— 
about 922,000 square miles—more than Austria, France, Spain, and the 
German Empire combined. 










TEXAS AND THE MEXICAN WAR 


327 


rather than give up all of Oregon, though it offered to 
divide along the forty-ninth parallel. This line was finally 
accepted, and a treaty was signed (1846) which gave us 



undisputed right, not to all of Oregon, but to all of it 
lying south of a line drawn along the forty-ninth parallel 
from the Rocky Mountains to the Pacific coast. Thus 
another splendid region was added to our immense 
territory. 









328 


THE WEST AND ANTISLAVERY 


551. The Wilmot Proviso.—Even before those vast 
regions of California and New Mexico were ours disputes 
arose between North and South as to whether the soil should 
be free or slave. It was generally agreed that Texas should be 
slave and Oregon free, but, at the very suggestion that more 
of Mexico’s domain was to be acquired, David Wilmot, of 
Pennsylvania, sprang to his feet in the House of Representa¬ 
tives and offered a resolution to keep slavery out of it. A 
bill was before the House (1846) to give the President 
$2,000,000—evidently that he might buy land from Mexico. 
Thinking, as Lowell expressed it in the “Biglow Papers,” 
that, “ They jest want this Californy so’s to lug new slave 
states in,” Wilmot moved a proviso that none of the territory 
to be bought with this money should be open to slavery. 
The proviso was not then adopted, but the principle that 
new United States lands should not be open to slavery came 
up again and again. Abraham Lincoln, while a representa¬ 
tive in Congress (1847-49), voted forty-two times in vain 
for that principle. This question became the great issue in 
the election of 1848. 


Suggested Readings 

Histories: (Fremont) McMurry, Pioneers of the Rocky Mountains. 
Davis, Under Six Flags, The Story of Texas. Wright, Stories of 
American Progress, 241-247. Elson, Side Lights on American His¬ 
tory, I. Wilson, Division and Reunion. 


CHAPTER XXXVIII 
SLAVERY AND THE NEW TERRITORY 

. 552. Whig and Democratic Nominations (1848).—The 

two great parties would have kept the slavery question out 
of politics in 1848 had that been possible. The Whig con¬ 
vention nominated for President, General Taylor, 1 the 


1 He was a citizen of Louisiana, and in order to please Northern 
voters, Millard Fillmore, of New York, was named for Vice President. 




SLAVERY AND THE NEW TERRITORY 329 

u Victor of Buena Vista/’ and relied upon the popularity 
of a military hero without taking the trouble to draw up 
a. platform. The Democrats nominated Lewis Cass, of 
Michigan, who had gained fame as a governor on the 
frontier, and as a Cabinet member and minister to France. 

553. Squatter Sovereignty.—Though the Democrats said 
nothing about slavery in their platform, their candidate, 
Cass, had lately declared that the people of each territory 
should decide for themselves whether they would have 
slavery or not. This doctrine, “ Squatter Sovereignty,” 
pleased the politicians, for it seemed to save quarreling about 
t'ae matter in Congress—a struggle dangerous to both 
parties. Besides, the doctrine seemed to emphasize the good 
old democratic principle of local self-government. 1 

554. “Free Soil Party”; Taylor and Fillmore Elected.— 
Many Whigs and Democrats did not like all this dodging of 
the great question of slavery; so, joining with the old Liberty 
P arty in a convention held at Buffalo, they formed a “ Free 
Soil Party.” Martin Van Buren and Charles Francis Adams 
were their candidates. In their platform they declared: 
(L) That Congress could no more make a slave than a king; 
(.2) that there must be “ free soil for a free people ”; (3) 
that there should be “ no more slave states, no more slave 
territories.” Their campaign cry was, “ Free soil, free 
speech, free labor, and free men.” The cause of freedom, 
however, was not yet strong enough to win. Taylor and 
Fillmore won the election, but, even before the inauguration, 
events happened which brought forward the slavery ques¬ 
tion clamoring for settlement. 

555. Gold Discovered in California.—Before Mexico had 
finished the act of ceding California to us, a man named 


1 Cass belonged to the same generation as Webster. Men of that age, 
devoted to the Union, were not ready to struggle fiercely against slavery 
and the South. So Cass was called a “Dough-face” by the anti¬ 
slavery men, and “a Northern man with Southern principles.” 




330 


THE WEST AND ANTISLAVERY 


Marshall, while digging a mill race for one Sutter, found some 
yellow grains which were tested and found to be gold. No 
care could keep the secret, and as the news spread, a mad race 
for the gold fields began. Towns on the Pacific coast became 
empty. Ships that came into San Francisco Harbor were 
abandoned by all the sailors, and for months lay helpless for 



Early Processes of Washing Gold in the West 


want of hands; stores closed; soldiers deserted the United 
States barracks, and everybody sought the gold fields. 1 

556. The “Forty-Niners.”—News traveled so slowly in 
those days that the East did not become assured of the gold 
finds until Polk’s message to Congress declared the truth. 
Spite of the great distance, the lack of railroads, and the 
terrors of the arid plains, rugged mountains, and fierce 

1 It is a very instructive fact that, after all the fever about gold, the 
real wealth of California, as men soon learned, was in her rich soil and 
beautiful climate. There was more wealth in the golden orange and 
golden wheat than in the golden metal. 
















SLAVERY AND THE NEW TERRITORY 


331 


Indian tribes, thousands were soon on their way across the 
plains in covered wagons, going, as a rule, in long trains, 
strong enough to resist Indian attacks. 1 By the end of 1849 
there were eighty thousand gold seekers in California— 



Forty- Niners,” as 
they were called. No 
government was as yet 
provided, and for a 
time the many reck¬ 
less adventurers were 
held in check only 
by rough methods, 2 
among which lynching 
was all too common. 
Urged by President 
Taylor, the better class 
of pioneers strove to 
get a real government. In November, 1849, a convention 
was called, which made a constitution forbidding slavery, 3 
and Congress was asked to admit California into the Union. 

557. Problems for Congress (1849-50).—When Congress 
met in December, 1849, there was a whole bundle of hard 
problems to solve. (1) The North wanted California ad¬ 
mitted as a free state, and the South objected. (2) South¬ 
ern slaveholders wanted the right to take their slaves 
into any part of the new region ceded by Mexico, and the 


Prospecting, 1855 

From a contemporary illustration in 
Harper's Magazine. 


1 Others went by ship around South America, or to the Panama 
Isthmus, crossing which, they were taken up by ships on the other side 
and hurried to the California coast. 

2 The kind of law which was found is illustrated by some claim notices. 
“Notis—to all and everybody. This is my claim 50 ft. on the Gulch, 
cordin to Clear Creek Dist. Law backed up by shot-gun amendments. 
T. Hall.” 

3 Although there were many Southerners among the “Forty-Niners, ” 
yet all were there to dig for gold, and they did not want slaveholders to 
mine with slave labor, because free whites would not work with them. 




332 


THE WEST AND ANTISLAVERY 


North objected. (3) The North wanted Congress to use its 
constitutional right to abolish slavery in the District of 
Columbia, and the South objected. (4) The South demanded 
a new fugitive slave law 1 because the old one could not be 
enforced in the free states, but the North objected. So violent 
was the feeling that on one side there were Southerners eager 
to take their states out of the Union and set up a slave confed¬ 
eracy, while at the North were Abolitionists eager to found a 
free republic and to cut off the slave section of the Union. 

558. Clay Suggests a Compromise.— For the moment 
men seemed, as Webster had said years before, “ to hang over 
the precipice of disunion,” trying to see if they could “ fathom 
the depth of the abyss below.” At a dinner in South Caro¬ 
lina one of the toasts was “ A Southern Confederacy,” and 
a convention to discuss it was planned by nine states. In 
this crisis Henry Clay, already known as the “ Compromiser” 
or the “ Peacemaker,” offered a plan which it was hoped 
would please both North and South and bring about a 
“ union of hearts.” Let the North have its way as to a free 
state in California, he urged. Join with them also in making 
a law to abolish the slave trade, the buying and selling 
of negroes, in the District of Columbia. 2 The South, he 
pleaded, ought, in return, to have its way as to a new stringent 
fugitive slave law. There is no use in banishing slavery by 
law from the new western territory; let us form territorial 
government, he said, and let that question take care of 
itself. 3 

559. A Great Debate.—A famous debate arose at once in 
Congress. Clay defended his plan in one of the greatest 

1 A law providing for the return of slaves, who had fled to free states, 
into the hands of their masters in the slave states. 

2 This would, of course, abolish slavery in the District. 

3 There was another quarrel over land claimed by Texas, which Con¬ 
gress proposed to include in the territory of New Mexico. Clay said, 
let Texas yield the claim in return for money to be paid by Congress to 
Texas. 




SLAVERY AND THE NEW TERRITORY 


333 


speeches of his life. Calhoun, in defense of the South, 
pleaded for the saving of “ equality ” between the sections. 
Webster, who saw how great the danger of disunion really 
was, made a great plea for the preservation of the Union by 
the means of compromise. He urged the North not to offend 
the South by forbidding slavery in New Mexico, for in so 
arid a region the plantation with its slave system could 
never thrive. “ I would not,” he declared, “ take pains to 
reaffirm an ordinance of nature nor to reenact the will of 
God.” In a word, nature had forbidden slavery there why 
should man? 

560. Seward and the “ Higher Law ”; Death of Taylor.— 

William H. Seward, of New York, who was henceforth to be 
one of the greatest defenders of Free Soil, spoke against the 
Compromise. Territories, he said, were free not only by the 
Constitution, but by a “ higher law,” the law of justice and 
humanity. After all the speeches, the scheme could not be 
passed as a whole. Each part was voted upon separately, 
however, and each was passed. The total result became 
known as the “ Compromise of 1850.” In the midst of the 
struggle President Taylor died and Vice President Fillmore 
took his place. 

561. Fugitive Slave Act.—The Compromise measure, 
which least pleased the people of the North was the Fugitive 
Slave Act. The Constitution had provided for the return of 
runaway slaves to their masters, and Congress (1793) had 
passed an act to prescribe the way it should be done. By 
1850, however, state judges in the North could no longer be 
relied upon to do the duty imposed upon them by the law. 
The new act (1850), therefore, gave the power to the United 
States officers, “ Commissioners,” to decide whether a negro 
claimed by a slaveholder was a slave or not. The negro 
could not testify. By the terms of the law all good citizens 
must aid in the capture of a fugitive slave, if requested, and 
anyone who helped him to escape could be fined and im¬ 
prisoned. 


334 


THE WEST AND ANTISLAVERY 


562. The “ Slave Catchers ” and “ Personal Liberty Laws.” 

—At once many “slave catchers ” or “man hunters” has¬ 
tened to the North and seized negroes who had escaped 
slavery years before. The sight of such attempts enraged 
many people who never had given heed before to the slavery 
question. There were soul-stirring scenes. Men of refine¬ 
ment and patriotism found themselves lawbreakers, for 



House of the Rev. John Rankin, Ripley, Ohio. 

One of the stations of the “ L T nderground Railroad.” 

they could not stand by and see a poor, appealing black 
fellow carried off to slavery; they were ready in their anger 
to break down jail doors and hurry away a fugitive to safety. 
“ Personal Liberty Laws,” passed in several states (1820-40) 
to prevent negroes being returned to slavery, were allowed 
to remain on the law books in spite of the national law. 

563. The “ Underground Railroad.” —In addition to 
this resistance to the national law as to fugitive slaves, the 
Abolitionists redoubled their efforts to aid runawav slaves. 
For years certain men had banded together for the purpose 
of helping slaves to escape to Canada by guiding them from 
place to place, by night or in disguise, along what came to be 


























SLAVERY AND THE NEW TERRITORY 


335 


known as the “ Underground Railroad.” It was only under¬ 
ground in the sense of being secret, and it was not a single 
road but a very network of roads, all leading to freedom. 
Some fifty thousand slaves had thus escaped in about fifty 
years, but among so many this had little effect upon the 
total number of slaves in the South. It only irritated the 
slaveholders and served to make slavery more hateful to 
Northern men, who met the escaped slaves and heard their 
sad stories, often greatly exaggerated. 

564. “Uncle Tom’s Cabin.”—While excitement was at its 
height, there appeared Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe’s “ Uncle 
Tom’s Cabin.” “ Eva ” and “ Topsy ” and “ Uncle Tom” 
roused many a laugh and called forth many a tear, for 
hundreds of thousands read the story, both in the North and 
in the South. Southerners said it was not true, and perhaps it 
was rather a picture of what slavery might be than what it 
was. It told both the pleasant and the sad things about 
slave life. The Northern people, however, noticed most the 
sorrowful picture of human beings whipped and sold and 
hunted. Everybody’s imagination was aroused as never 
before. That story and the Fugitive Slave Law brought 
more Northern people than before to believe that slavery 
must not be allowed to go farther into the new states and 
territories. 


Suggested Readings 

Histories: Sexton, Stories of California. Wilson, Division and 
Reunion. American Statesmen Series, Henry Clay, Daniel Webster , 
William H. Seward, Abraham Lincoln. Elson, Side Lights on Amer¬ 
ican History. Brown, Stephen A. Douglas. McLaughlin, Lewis Cass. 
Brooks, Century Booh of Famous Americans. Rogers, The True 
Henry Clay. 

Sources: Hart, American History Told by Contemporaries, IV, 

75-83. 


336 


THE WEST AND ANTISLAVERY 


CHAPTER XXXIX 
WESTERN SETTLEMENT AND SLAVERY 

565. The Election of 1852.—In 1852 President Fillmore’s 
term was drawing to an end, and a new election was due. 
The two great parties, Whig and Democratic, tried to believe 
that the Compromise of 1850 had put an end to the slavery 
quarrel. The Democrats nominated Franklin Pierce, of 
whom nobody knew very much, and in their platform said 
they would resist all efforts in or out of Congress to agitate 
the slavery question. The Whigs, having twice won with 
famous soldiers as their leaders, tried again with General 
Scott as their candidate. They, too, declared that they 
would hold to the Compromise, but so many of their party 
in the North were angry over the Fugitive Slave Act, and 
displeased with “ Old Fuss and Feathers,” as Scott was 
nicknamed, that twenty-seven states went Democratic and 
only four Whig. President Pierce was inaugurated March 4, 
1853. 

566., New Inventions and Their Effects.—The year after 
Pierce became President a great exhibition was held in New 
York in a vast building 
of glass and iron called 
the “ Crystal Palace.” 

A thoughtful man might 
there have seen much 
that would make clear 
why there were so many 
differences between the 
North and the South, 
much which would de¬ 
cide who would win in 
the great struggle so fatefully coming on. Most of the new 
inventions there shown were helping the manufacturer and 



The Crystal Palace in New York, 

1855 

From a contemporary print. 










WESTERN SETTLEMENT AND SLAVERY 337 

the farmer of the North rather than the planter of the 
South. There were steam printing presses, power looms, 
planing machines, sewing machines—all best used by the 
free white laborer of the North. The reapers and mowers, 
but lately invented, were there to show how the white 
farmer’s labor was made easier. Even where the Southern 
planter raised grains, the ignorant slave laborer could not 
make use of this intricate machinery. 

567. The Horse Reaper Aids Westward Movement.— 
The horse reaper, which meant so much to the Northern 
farmer, had been invented by Cyrus H. McCormick in 1831, 

but did not come 
into general use 
until about 1845. 
Ten years later it 
was estimated that 
it added fifty-five 
millions of dollars 
yearly to our coun¬ 
try’s wealth. 1 It 
enabled farmers to 
cultivate so much 
larger farms that 
the edge of civilization was moved westward at the rate of 
fifty miles a year by its use. This rapid settlement of the 
West by Free State men was all-important then, for it was 
these men who gave strength to the North for the great 
conflict to preserve the Union. 

568. Immigration. —One need not wonder long whence 
came all the settlers to people this western region; one has 
but to note that between 1820 and 1829 one hundred 
and ten thousand immigrants came from Europe, and five 
hundred thousand in the next ten years. A great number 


1 The cost of bread was cheapened and the whole human race thus 
benefited. 










338 


THE WEST AND ANTISLAVERY 


hastened westward to find homes on the cheap and fertile 
lands of the frontier. In 1842 one hundred thousand men, 
women, and children came to our 
shores. Nor was that the highest 
mark, for in 1846 there was a 
potato famine in Ireland, and, as 
potatoes were the chief food 
there, starvation drove many 
thousands to America. Then 
there was a great political up¬ 
heaval in Germany (1848), and 
many who fought in vain for free 
government there, fled to America 
to enjoy its free institutions. 1 In 
1854 there came a stream of four 
hundred and twenty-eight thou¬ 
sand people. 

569. Why the Immigrants Went 

to the North.- Nearly all these Chart Showing Increase 
, i i, tvt of Immigration by 

people came to the Northern Decides 

States because the climate there 

was more like that to which they were accustomed, and 
because there was a greater variety of things to do in the 
North. The laborer who had learned a trade in Europe, or 
had learned there to run a factory machine, or to raise fruit 
and grain was much more likely to find employment among the 
varied industries of the North than upon the great cotton 
plantations of the South. Most of the cities were in the North, 
and many of the immigrantswho had lived in cities in Europe 
naturally sought the cities in America. Finally, the laborer 
preferred to work among freemen and not among slaves. 

570. The “Know-Nothing Party.” —There was some op¬ 
position to foreigners and to their having a right to vote. 

1 Steam navigation was making the crossing of the Atlantic Ocean 
much easier and quicker, and it no longer had the terrors which it had 
when the passage took a month instead of ten days. 

















WESTERN SETTLEMENT AND SLAVERY 339 


The so-called “ Know-Nothing ” Party, aiming to preserve 
America for Americans, came into existence (1854), rose for 
a time to the highest importance, and then disappeared. It 
called itself the “American Party,” or the “Order of the 
Star-Spangled Banner.” It loved silly secret watchwords 
and signs; it pretended to be in a dreadful fright about 
American liberties. About the liberty of the black man it 
had nothing to say. When asked questions about the party, 
a member was apt to say, “ I don’t know.” So they were 
called “ Know-Nothings.” 1 

571. The Kansas-Nebraska Bill —The westward march of 
population made it seem wise to give a territorial government 
to the region lying to the west of the states of Missouri and 
Iowa 2 and the territory of Minnesota. All this vast area 
was promised to freedom by the Missouri Compromise 
(1820). In 1854 Stephen A. Douglas, 3 of Illinois, a powerful 
debater and a man of immense vigor of will and action, 
brought into the Senate a bill to organize a new territory in 
this western region, to be called Nebraska. At once the old 
slavery issue arose like the genie of the bottle in the “Ara¬ 
bian Nights,” affrighting both North and South, and it was 
never again conjured back into the old bottle of compromise. 

The bill was soon changed so as to provide for two terri¬ 
tories—Kansas and Nebraska. By this bill the Missouri 
Compromise was repealed, and the question of slavery was 
to be left to the people in the territories themselves. It was 
declared to be the purpose of the bill “ not to legislate slavery 
into any territory or state, nor exclude it therefrom; but 


1 When one accosted a “brother,” he said, “What time?” The reply 
was, “Time for work.” Then the first would say “Are you?” and the 
second would answer, “We are. ” Then they could talk. If one wished 
to know the purpose of a meeting he would say, “Have you seen Sam 
to-day?” 

2 Admitted in 1846 as a free state. 

* A typical western man, believing in the right of the frontiersmen 
to rule the lands they had opened up with so much trouble and hardships. 




340 


THE WEST AND ANTISLAVERY 


to leave the people thereof perfectly free to form and regu¬ 
late their domestic institutions in their own way, subject 
only to the Constitution of the United States.” Congress 
and the people of the United States were to sit idly by and 
watch the struggle. Before there was a vote on Douglas’ 
bill a fierce debate went on in Congress. The old leaders, 
Clay, Webster, and Calhoun, were now dead, but in their 
places were new men, less disposed to compromise, and eager 
to battle for their ideas of right. 

572. Debate and Passage of Kansas-Nebraska Bill.— 
Vigorous fearless champions of antislavery, like Salmon P. 
Chase, of Ohio, denounced the bill as a gross violation of 
faith of the agreement between North and South in 1820. 
Charles Sumner, of Massachusetts, a polished orator and a 
fierce hater of slavery, was glad that the day of doubt was 
gone; now men must choose to defend slavery or to struggle 
for freedom. Seward, of New York, dared the slaveholders 
to come on and fight for the soil of Kansas: “ God give the 
victory to the side that is strong in numbers as it is in right! ” 
Douglas, urged on by Jefferson Davis, the foremost champion 
of the slaveholders, carried the bill on to its passage with a 
force that explained why men called him the “ Little Giant.” 1 
The final vote was in favor of the bill. The North was 
so enraged that many men who never had been aroused 
before came out for freedom. 

573. “Bleeding Kansas.” —At once there arose in Kansas, 
where settlement had begun, a long struggle between the 
Free Soil immigrants from the North and the slaveholding 
pioneers from the South. 2 At the first election hundreds of 
Missourians, with music and banners, pistols, rifles, and 

1 He had a coarsely dramatic way. In debate he would tear off his 
collar and tie and speak with a vehemence that overbore all opposition. 

2 Free State men founded Lawrence, Topeka, and Ossawatomie, 
while slavery men founded Atchison. Leavenworth, Lecompton. Lines 
were so strictly drawn that “people spoke of an antislavery colt or a 
proslavery cow.” 



WESTERN SETTLEMENT AND SLAVERY 341 

knives, hurried over the border to outvote the Free Soilers. 
A traveler saw some of them returning, four wagon loads, 
“and in them were six men. A pole about five feet high 
stuck bolt upright at the front of the wagon; across the 
stick at right angles was tied a bowie knife, a black cambric 
flag with a death’s head daubed on it in white paint, and a 
long streamer of beautiful glossy Missouri hemp floated 
from the pole,” the symbols of the border men returning 
from Kansas. On the other hand, companies of Northerners 
armed with Sharpe’s rifles hurried to meet the crusaders 
from the South. This was u Squatter Sovereignty.” 
For statesmanlike debate in Congress was substituted 
brutal conflict. There was robbery and murder by both 
sides. 1 In a single year two hundred persons were killed and 
two million dollars in property was destroyed. “ Bleeding 
Kansas,” as Sumner called it, gave a fine object lesson of 
“popular sovereignty.” At first the slaveholders won the 
elections, organized a slave territory, and adopted the laws 
of Missouri, slave code and all. 

574. Free Soil Finally Wins. —But the Free State men 
refused to be governed by such laws. They convened at 
Topeka, drew up a constitution, and asked Congress to admit 
Kansas as a free state. This Congress did not then do; but it 
was already plain that slavery was no match for freedom 
when it came to peopling new territory. By 1858 the 
Free Soil men were in control of the territorial government. 
In 1861 Kansas became a state in the Union. 

575. Formation of the Republican Party. —Both the 
Whig and the Democratic parties were much hurt by the 
failure of their efforts to stop the slavery wrangle. The 
failure of compromise and the resentment felt against the 
Fugitive Slave Law disgusted thousands of Northern Whigs, 
and the Kansas-Nebraska Act finished the party’s ruin. 

1 John Brown was the leader of the Northern force when they avenged 
the burning of the free town Lawrence by the massacre of the slave- 
state men at Ossawatomie. 



342 


THE WEST AND ANTISLAVERY 


The Democratic Party, too, lost many thousands of Northern 
voters, who went over to the ranks of the Free Soilers. Out 
of these great numbers of discontented voters from the old 
parties, there was formed a party pledged to oppose the 
extension of slavery. Its rallying cry was, “No more slave 
territory.” In Michigan 1 the party was called the Republi¬ 
can Party and the name was soon widely accepted; in 1856 
it was organized as a national party in a great convention at 
Pittsburg. 

576. The Presidential Election. —The Republican Party 
nominated for President, John C. Fremont, who had Avon 
fame as a “pathfinder” in the far West. The party declared 
against the extension of slavery and said Congress could 
and must stop it. The Democrats nominated James 
Buchanan, of Pennsylvania, and declared their approval of 
the Kansas-Nebraska Act. This made their candidate and 
platform popular in the South. Buchanan was elected, but 
the Republicans alarmed their opponents by their strength, 
for they carried all but five of the nonslaveholding states. 

577. The Dred Scott Decision. —Hardly had Buchanan 
been inaugurated before the Supreme Court stirred the 
country to its very depths by its decision in the case of a 
slave named Dred Scott, who had sued his master for assault 
and battery. He claimed that he was free because his master 
had taken him into a free state and also into territory where 
slavery was forbidden by the Missouri Compromise. Some 
Abolitionists took up his cause and gave money for his legal 
expenses. The Court declared that Scott, being a negro, 
could not be a citizen and could not, therefore, sue as such in 
the Federal courts. This was sufficient ground for dismissing 
the suit without more ado, but in the vain hope of quieting 
the slavery quarrel Chief Justice Taney went on to say that 
the Missouri Compromise was unlawful, and never had been 


1 It was a “fusion party” made up of Whigs, Democrats, and Free 
Soilers, and, as such, put tickets in the field in eight other states. 




WESTERN SETTLEMENT AND SLAVERY 343 

lawful. Slave owners, the Court said, had the right to 
take their slaves into the territories; Congress could not 
stop them. If this was true, what was to become of the 
Republican Party doctrine that Congress could and must 
keep slavery out of the territories? But it was too late 
for even the Supreme Court to awe men into silence on the 
slavery question. 

578. Lincoln-Douglas Debates. —The real situation was 
made clear by a great debate between Abraham Lincoln 1 and 
Douglas. Both were candidates for the senatorship in Illinois, 
and in a series of public speeches they debated the slavery 
question. Douglas was considered the ablest debater in the 
land, but he found his match in Lincoln. Douglas tried to 
ride two horses at once, but Lincoln showed that they were 
going in different directions; Douglas could not cling to his 

pet doctrine of “Squat¬ 
ter Sovereignty” and 
accept at the same time 
the doctrine of the Dred 
Scott decision. Lincoln 
was not elected Senator; 
but the people of the 
whole land, who had 
been reading the morning 
papers with breathless in¬ 
terest, knew, when these 
speeches were over, that 
out on the Illinois prairie was a man with a conscience, who 
could think straight, speak straight, and look facts in the face. 



1 Abraham Lincoln was born in Kentucky, but moved with his 
parents to Indiana, and thence to Illinois. Poverty drove him to the 
hardest kind of work, but he seized every moment at the plow or by 
the fireside for study. He became a lawyer, and served one term as a 
Congressman. He early learned to hate slavery, and declared that no 
man had a right to govern another man, white or black, without that 
man’s consent. 





THE WEST AND ANTISLAVERY 


344 

579. John Brown’s Raid.—During the debate Lincoln had 
said that the nation could not long exist half slave and half 
free; it must be either one or the other. Moreover, agitation, 
he declared, “will not cease until a crisis shall have been 
reached and passed.” As if to make good his prophecy, both 
North and South were soon raised to the highest pitch of 



A Scene at One of the Lincoln-Douglas Debates 

excitement by a raid on Harper’s Ferry, a government 
arsenal in Virginia (1859). John Brown, one of the most 
violent Abolitionists, who had taken part in the bloody 
struggle in Kansas, took into his head the mad, but heroic, 
scheme of inciting the slaves to revolt. He believed that if 
they knew there was a place in the Southern mountain district 
whither they might flee, they would do so by the thousands. 

How little he knew of the poor black or of his help¬ 
lessness! Finally, Brown and a few companions one night 




WESTERN SETTLEMENT AND SLAVERY 345 


crossed the long bridge from Maryland, seized the arsenal, 
took refuge in an old fire-engine house, and prepared for their 
great work of rescue. They did not have to wait long. 
Virginia was instantly aroused, the conspirators were seized, 
and Brown and several others were hanged. Most rational 
men of the North deeply lamented Brown’s faults but no 
one could deny his devoted bravery. The South, always in 
fear of a negro rebellion, was now convinced, or nearly so, 
that it was impossible to save slavery and stay in the Union. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: (McCormick) Williams, Some Successful Americans. 
Wright, Stories of American Progress. Johnson, Life of Stephen A. 
Douglas. Elson, Side Lights on American History , 294-309. Bolton, 
Famous Americans. 

Sources: Hart, Source Boole, 284-29G. Hart, American History 
Told by Contemporaries , IV, 104-118. 


VII 

PERIOD OF CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 


CHAPTER XL 

SECESSION.—CIVIL WAR BEGINS 

580. The Democratic Party Divides.—While both sections 
were wrought up to intense distrust of each other, the pres¬ 
idential campaign of 1860 took place. The Northern and 
Southern Democrats had managed to hold together up to 
this time, but in convention at Charleston they split. The 
Northern faction of the party, led by Douglas, would not go 
as far as the South wanted to go in the way of demanding 
protection for slavery in the territories. 

581. Presidential Candidates.—As there was no reconciling 
the Southern element to the views of the Northern faction, 
in the end each named a candidate. Douglas was the 
Northern candidate and J. C. Breckinridge the Southern. 
A new party of moderate, cautious men, whose strength lay 
in the border states, nominated Governor John Bell, of 
Tennessee, and, expressing their purpose in their party 
name, the Constitutional Union Party, asked men to end the 
slavery quarrel and to make their chief aim the saving of the 
Union. 

582. Republicans Nominate Abraham Lincoln.—The Re¬ 
publican convention at Chicago was most dramatic. It was 
held in an immense hall with thousands of onlookers. Three 
leaders, Seward, Chase, and Lincoln, battled for the nomina¬ 
tion. In the midst of a mad outburst of excitement Lincoln 
was nominated, because he was what politicians call an 
“ available man/’ and not because men realized the grandeur 
of his character, his fine common sense, or his deep insight 
into the truth. Hannibal Hamlin, of Maine, was nominated 
for Vice President. 


346 


SECESSION.—CIVIL WAR BEGINS 347 

583. The Election.—Thus, with four candidates in the 
field, the presidential contest was bitterly fought. Lin¬ 
coln carried every free state but one, 1 and thus secured 180 
electoral votes out of the total of 303. The South, as we can 
see now, was in no special danger. Lincoln was not in favor 
of trying to do away with slavery within the slave states. 
Moreover, the Republicans did not have a majority in either 
House of Congress, and so, even if they wished, could not do 



Map of the Election of 1860 


much. But the South was angry. Anger had been grow¬ 
ing for thirty years, and the Southern people resented the 
feeling of the Republicans toward slavery. “ Lincoln is a 
mere sectional President/’ they said. They believed that 
there was no safety for them in the Union. They, therefore, 
prepared to leave. 

584. Secession of South Carolina.—South Carolina, which 
thirty years before had tried to nullify a law of Congress, 

1 New Jersey. The electoral vote of New Jersey was divided 
between Lincoln and Douglas. 

















































348 


CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 


was the first state to act. When Lincoln’s election was 
certain, the Legislature called a convention to decide whether 
South Carolina would secede from the Union. The conven¬ 
tion met in Charleston, and December 20th adopted the 
declaration “ that the union now subsisting between South 
Carolina and the other states ... is hereby dissolved.” 
There was great joy throughout the city. The chimes and 
bells of the churches were rung. A cannon called “ Old 
Secession ” thundered the news. As the streets filled with 
people, all faces wore smiles. Old men ran and shouted in 
the streets; palmetto flags, the South Carolina colors, were 
flung to the breeze, and all was done to show the people’s 
feeling that this was another Declaration of Independence 
like that of 1776. 



585. Other States Follow South Carolina.—Before the 
end of the winter Georgia, Alabama, Florida, Mississippi, 
Louisiana, and Texas 
passed like ordinances 
of secession. A plan 
of compromise was 
offered in Congress by 
Senator Crittenden, 
of Kentucky, but the 
terms were rejected 
by both sides; South¬ 
ern senators and rep¬ 
resentatives began to 
leave their seats, some 
with defiant, some with 
regretful, speeches. 

586. Confederate 
States of America.— 

Then six of the South¬ 
ern States sent delegates to Montgomery, Ala., where 
a constitution was formed, and the “ Confederate States 
of America’’were organized with Jefferson Davis, President, 


The State House at Montgomery, 
Ala., 1860 

The building in which the Confederate 
Government was organized. 





































SECESSION.—CIVIL WAR BEGINS 349 

and Alexander H. Stephens, Vice President. 1 It was de¬ 
clared that the foundations of the new government were laid, 

that its cornerstone rested upon 
the great truth that the negro 
is not equal to the white man. 2 

587. Buchanan Does Nothing. 
—Meanwhile President Buchanan 
had done nothing to stem the tide 
of secession. He was long under 
the influence of the Southern 
members of his Cabinet, and 
when they were gone he sought 
only to delay action until Lin¬ 
coln’s inauguration. 

588. Many Willing to Let 
South Go.—Horace Greeley, the 

great newspaper man, said the South had a clear moral 
right to form an independent nation if it chose. General 
Scott, commander of the armies, wanted to let “ the erring 
sisters depart in peace,” and Seward seems to have thought 
likewise. The Abolitionists were glad the South was out of 
the Union, for that rid the North of responsibility for slavery. 
The true spirit of most Northern people was yet to be seen. 

589. Lincoln Reasons with the South.— From his home in 
Illinois, Lincoln had anxiously watched all these events, 
unable to do anything until his inauguration on March 4, 
1861. As that day drew near, he set out for Washington, 
speaking wisely to many thousands on the way, though, to 
avoid threatened assassination, he traveled in disguise from 
Philadelphia to Washington. In a wise and moderate inau¬ 
gural address he let both North and South know his policy. 
He first assured the South that he did not propose to inter- 

1 Later they were elected by the people of the South. 

2 Stephens, like some other Southerners, had strongly opposed seces¬ 
sion. When Georgia was considering the matter he declared secession 
the “height of madness.” 




350 


CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 


fere with slavery in the states where it existed. “ No state,” 
he declared, “ upon its own mere motion can lawfully get out 
of the Union.” “ The Union is unbroken,” he said, and 
“ to the extent of my ability I shall take care . . . that the 
laws of the Union be faithfully executed in all the states.” 
“ In doing this,” he said, “ there needs to be no bloodshed or 
violence, and there shall be none unless it be forced upon the 
national authority.” In closing he seemed to plead with the 
South. “ In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow-countrymen, 
and not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war. . . . 
You can have no conflict without being yourselves the 
aggressors. ... we are not enemies, but friends.” 



The Bombardment of Fort Sumter 
From a contemporary print. 


590. Fort Sumter Captured by the South. —Already 

many forts and customhouses and other government prop¬ 
erty had been seized by Southern authorities, because 
Buchanan had done nothing to prevent it. In Charleston 
Harbor, Fort Sumter was held by a Union force under Major 














351 


SECESSION.—CIVIL WAR BEGINS 

Anderson, but it was poorly equipped and Lincoln decided 
to send supplies. Thereupon, by order of Jefferson Davis, 
nineteen batteries opened fire upon Anderson’s heroic band 
of one hundred and twenty-eight men. Soon the fort was 
afire, and the walls tumbling about the soldiers, who could 
only fire a gun now and then to show that they were still 
unconquered. When all was done that man could do, 
Anderson surrendered, and marched out (April 14th) with 

flying flags and beating 
drums. Charleston and 
all the Confederacy re¬ 
joiced. Lincoln saw his 
duty clearly; without a 
moment’s delay he called 
for seventy-five thousand 
volunteers. 

591. 300,000 Men Rise 
to Save the Union. —The 

war was begun. It was 
astounding to see the re¬ 
sponse to the President’s 
call. The answer was 
quick and hearty; 1 men 
saw only the insult to the Stars and Stripes, the attack on the 
Union. Not to fight slaveholders did men seize the sword 
and bayonet, but to fight men who were seeking to destroy 
the Union. There was an end to the talk about letting the 
“ erring sisters go in peace.” Douglas and other Northern 
Democrats promised Lincoln their heartiest aid in preserving 

1 Within two days the Sixth Massachusetts Regiment was on the way 
to Washington. As it passed through New York City a witness said, 
“We saw the heads of armed men, the gleam of their weapons, the reg¬ 
imental colors, all moving on pageant-like; but naught could we hear 
save that hoarse, heavy surge—one general acclaim, one wild shout of 
joy and hope, one endless cheer, rolling up and down, from side to side, 
above, below, to right, to left. ” This was typical of the feeling every¬ 
where. 











352 


CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 




The Confederate Capitol at 
Richmond 


the Union. Men met in city and town and on the four corners 
to pledge their lives for the Union. Fife and drum and stars 
and stripes aroused the patriotism of all. Colleges were 
emptied; factories lost 
half their workmen, as 
the war spirit kindled. 

Three hundred thousand 
men were under arms 
within three months. 

592. The South Rushes 
to Arms. —The South, 
too, was now eager for 
the struggle. The enlist¬ 
ing of men and the offers 
of money matched the 
activity at the North. “ The flower of the Southern youth, 
the prime of Southern manhood, are collected in the camps 
of Virginia,” wrote one witness. “ North Carolina is ablaze 
from one extremity to the other,” said another. They felt 
all the zeal of the patriots of 1776, for in their minds liberty 
was the end they sought. 

593. New States Enter Confederacy. —Amidst the excite¬ 
ment four more states seceded—Virginia, North Carolina, 

Tennessee, and Arkansas, making 
eleven in all. When Virginia seceded, 
the Confederate Capitol was moved to 
Richmond, because it was near to 
Washington, around which the strug¬ 
gle was sure to rage. 

594. Border States Remain in Union. 
—There was thus far one damper 
on the success of the seceding states. 
The Union men in the slaveholding border states, Maryland, 
Delaware, Kentucky, and Missouri, were greater in number 
than the Secessionists, and Lincoln’s wisdom and forbear¬ 
ance kept them in the Union. The western part of Virginia, 


Confederacy 
























SLAVE STATES NOT JOINING THE CONFEDERACY 

























CONDITIONS IN NORTH AND SOUTH 353 

too, was little interested in slavery, because it was largely a 
mountain region. It broke away from Virginia, and later 
became a separate state—West Virginia. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: Wilson, Division and Reunion. Nicolay, Boys ’ Life of 
Abraham Lincoln. (Lincoln) Lodge and Roosevelt, Hero Tales from 
American History. Sparliawk, Life of Lincoln for Boys. Coffin, 
Drum Beat of the Nation. 

Sources: Hart, Source Booh, 299-312. Hart, American History 
Told by Contemporaries, IV, 216-224. 


CHAPTER XLI 

CONDITIONS IN NORTH AND SOUTH 

595. Population of North and South. —Before entering 
upon the story of the terrible war between the North and 
South, it will help us to understand the events better if we 
measure their relative strength and resources. The popula¬ 
tion of the whole country was over 31,000,000, of which 
19,000,000 lived in the free states and 12,000,000 in the 
slave states. Added to the free states’ superior numbers 
there were several millions of people in border slave states 
which remained in the Union. 1 

596. Dependence of the South. —Yet mere numbers were 
not the only difference. In the North, where most of the 
cities were found, there were many rapidly growing manu¬ 
facturing towns, while in the South there were no manu¬ 
facturing towns and little commerce. 2 “ From the rattle 
with which the nurse tickled the ear of the child to the 

1 Added to these were the people of East Tennessee and West Vir¬ 
ginia, so that there were about 22,100,000 people in the states and parts 
of states which supported the Union and 8,900,000 in the opposing 
section. Of the latter, 3,500,000 were slaves. 

2 Of 107 cotton mills only eight were in the South. Of 158 cities of 
over 8,000 inhabitants, 137 were in states which stayed in the Union, 
twenty-one in the Confederacy. 



354 


CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 


shroud for the dead,” declared a Southern speaker, “ every¬ 
thing that the Southerners used came from the North.” 
Though the South was so wholly given to the farming, or, 
rather, the plantation industry, the planters in the cotton 
districts did not even raise all their own food, but bought 
great stores of corn and hay products from the Northwest. 
This dependence upon the North and the outside world was 
a source of weakness in time of war. 

597. Effects of Building Railroads. —The North was now 
better prepared to fight in a civil war than she had been 
even ten years before. The northern states east of the 
Mississippi were now bound together by railroads (see p. 355). 
Troops could thus be rapidly transported from one section of 
the country to the other. In respect to business interests the 
East and West were more closely connected than ever before 
and better prepared to fight a common fight. 

598. Development of Resources. —In many ways the 
North was better able than the South to get along without 
the other section. Besides the Northern farms which raised 
all the varied food products, there were vast resources which 
were already being developed. There were great iron mines 
and copper mines in northern Michigan; and Pennsylvania 
had just discovered that she was rich not only in coal and 
iron, but in petroleum, which gushed as if from great geysers 
when a hole was drilled in the earth. The Ohio River bore 
an ever-growing flatboat trade in bituminous coal, mined 
in Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and Ohio. On the Great 
Lakes men had begun to carry the white pine of Michigan 
and Wisconsin to ready markets. There was silver in Colo¬ 
rado and Nevada. Lead mines had been discovered in 
Missouri. The South, too, had hidden resources of this 
sort, but so engrossed had she been in the raising of cotton, 
that all other sources of wealth were neglected. 

599. Schools and Education in North and South.— Another 
advantage the North had was in the education of the labor¬ 
ing class. As the census returns showed, the percentage 


CONDITIONS IN NORTH AND SOUTH 355 

of those unable to read and write was far higher in the 
South than in the North, even if the negro slaves were not 
counted. The slaveholding families looked after the edu¬ 



cation of their children by a private tutor system, or by 
sending them either North or abroad for college training. 
In public schools, however, the South was far behind the 
North, and the labor on which the South was built was 
















356 


CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 


uneducated labor, the labor of ignorant blacks. In the 
North, on the other hand, the country and district schools 
were ever being bettered, and most of the Northern cities 
had added high schools to the older common schools; over 
a hundred colleges 1 were founded in the twenty years pre¬ 
ceding the war. 

600. Northern Conditions Shown by the Number of Great 
Writers.— In the North the larger cities and many of the 
larger towns had public libraries. These were stored in 
the main with the works of English authors, but America, 
too, had its literature. Parkman was turning out his charm¬ 
ing history of the French in America, while Motley wrote 
his fascinating “ Rise of the Dutch Republic.” Prescott 
had told the romantic story of the Aztecs and Peruvians. 
Lowell’s and Emerson’s essays were becoming classics for all 
English-reading peoples. Holmes was widely enjoyed. 
Whittier, Poe, Bryant, and Longfellow delighted many read¬ 
ers of poetry, while Cooper, Irving, Hawthorne, and Poe 
pleased the lovers of fiction. The patriotic influence of 
these native writers was felt in the length and breadth of 
the North, but in the South a very small number of plant¬ 
ers’ families read them. 

601. The Telegraph and its Value to Each Section.— The 

inventive genius of the North, meanwhile, had made possible 
the operation of the long lines of 
railroad which, as we have seen, 
had been built within the last 
twenty years. Samuel F. B. Morse 
demonstrated in 1844 that a sim¬ 
ple device would enable one to send ^ HE First Telegraph 

i , . , , v , , Instrument 

messages between widely distant 

points by means of an electric current passing through a wire. 2 
This was the electric telegraph, and by means of it many 



1 Eighty-two sectarian colleges and twenty nonsectarian. 

* Look in the encyclopedia for the exact nature of the early telegraph. 








PREPARATION FOR WAR 


357 


trains could be controlled from a single office. Like Puck, 
the telegraph could put a girdle around the earth in forty 
minutes. It could run ahead of any train, and by its warn¬ 
ing save collisions—all too common in the early days of the 
railroad. All this made possible the running of many trains 
where only one dared run before. 1 One can readily see also 
what a great difference the telegraph would make in war 
time, because of the rapidity with which commands might 
be sent to armies. 


Suggested Readings 

Histories: (Telegraph) Mowry, American Inventions and Inventors. 
Coman, Industrial History of the United States. Wilson, Division 
and Reunion. Trowbridge, Samuel F. B. Morse. Doubleday, Stories 
of Inventors. 


CHAPTER XLII 

PREPARATION FOR WAR AND THE ATTITUDE OF 

EUROPE 

602. Military Training North and South. —When the 
Southerners fired on the flag flying from Fort Sumter in 
Charleston Harbor, thousands of Northerners, as we have 
seen, leaped to the defense of the Union. But these men 
were without military training, except in some cases a 
militia training, which was far from adequate. Some 
cities sent well-trained militia companies, but the greater 
number of the volunteers who arrived in camp had neither 
experience under fire nor the habits that come of military 
drill. In most cases even their leaders had little military 
training, for the graduates of West Point were kept in 
the regular army and not distributed among the volunteers. 

Some of the officers trained at West Point went over to 

1 The Atlantic cable was laid through the efforts of Cyrus W. Field 
in 1858, but ceased to work after three weeks, and was not success¬ 
fully laid again until 1866, after the war. 



CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 


358 

the Confederate cause. Of these the greatest was. Robert 
E. Lee, reputed the ablest officer in the army ; a noble 
character, whose motives for joining the Southern cause 
were pure and high. 1 Davis, 
federacy, was also a West 
Pointer and a veteran of the 
Mexican War. It was little 
wonder, therefore, that the 
South with such leaders and 
with a people used to firearms, 
to out-of-door life, and to the 
riding of horses 2 should be the 
first really prepared for war 
and the first to win victories. 

603. Getting the Money 
with which to Fight.—In tu *5 
long run, the North was sure 
to have a vast advantage 
with its almost exhaustless 
resources. At once the North 
began to draw upon these. A 
new tariff law was passed and, 
as the war went on, the rates were raised again and again. 
Many new taxes were laid ere long; but they did not furnish 
enough money. Congress therefore (1862) turned at last 
to “ legal tender notes/ 1 paper money which tradesmen 
and all must accept, though the paper would be worthless 
if the Government should fall. In 1863 the Government 
devised a system of national banks which were given the 
right to issue bank bills by buying United States bonds. 
Scheme as it would, however, the treasury had to borrow 

1 He was offered the command of the Northern armies, but believing 
that honor called him to share the fate of his state, he left his beauti¬ 
ful home at Arlington and joined the Confederate forces. 

2 A matter of great importance when cavalry was needed in a country 
where the most effective war could be carried on by that means. 


the President of the Con- 



















PREPARATION FOR WAR 


359 


repeatedly in order to meet the vast expenditures of the 
war. Yet, in spite of ever-growing taxes and excises, the 
Northern people bore with patience all their burdens in 
their patriotic desire to save the Union. 

604. The Navy and the Blockade.—One of the greatest 
expenses at the very first was the buying or building of a 
navy to blockade all the Southern coast from Virginia to 
Texas, and recapture the forts and ports seized by the 
seceding states. Lincoln and his advisers saw at once 
how much it would weaken the South to drive from its 
ports all ships bringing the manufactured goods which 
were sorely needed 1 or seeking to buy and take away the 
great quantities of cotton and tobacco which the South 
wished to sell. With this purpose Lincoln proclaimed to 
all the world (April 19 and 27, 1861) that the Southern 
ports were blockaded. The navy department began buy¬ 
ing tugboats, ferryboats, ocean liners, everything that would 
float, and in a marvelously short time the blockade was in 
force, ever closing its toils more tightly about the South 
until this “ anaconda” method of strangling the Confederacy 
began to make it suffer. 

605. Blockade Runners.—One of the greatest nopes of 
the Confederacy was that England, in her desire to get 
cotton for her extensive cotton mills, 2 would aid the South 
in the war. “ Cotton is King ” was the Southern cry. In 
other words, it would rule England’s conduct, and perhaps 
that of France, too, which also had great cotton manufac¬ 
tures. At first, however, English aid went no further than 
winking at a forbidden trade with Southern ports, carried on 
by vessels of great speed, long and low, painted a dull gray, 
and with smokestacks which might be lowered to the deck. 

1 The South had no machine shops, gun factories, or any factory of 
military supplies, but did have 4,700,000 bales of cotton to give in ex¬ 
change for such supplies. 

2 These employed thousands of men, and the prosperity of parts of 
England depended on them; starvation would threaten if mills closed. 



CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 


360 

These vessels were used to evade the Government blockaders 
on dark or stormy nights, and to carry cotton to the British 



A Typical Blockade Runner 

port of Nassau in the West Indies, returning on some moon¬ 
less and starless night with the manufactured things the 
South so much needed. 1 Clever 
as the blockade runners were, 
however, some fifteen hundred 
vessels were captured or de¬ 
stroyed by the Union navy during 
the war. 

606. The “ Trent Affair.”— 

The Confederate government in 
its eagerness to get England and 
France to step in and help, sent The Relation of Nassau 

two agents, Mason and Slidell, TO THE Blockaded Ports 

, • , tt of the South 

to urge intervention. Having 

escaped to Havana, they took passage (November, 1861) 
on the Trent, a British mail steamer. An American vessel, 
the San Jacinto , stopped the Trent and took Mason 
and Slidell prisoners, doing just the thing America had 
always denied England’s right to do. 2 Yet Americans 

1 So effective became the blockade before the war ended that the 
South suffered for want of clothing, paper, salt, coffee, medicines, and 
even guns with which to fight. 

2 Remember the complaint against England in the years before the 
War of 1812- 
















PREPARATION FOR WAR 


361 

were so delighted with the seizure of Mason and Slidell that 
our Government was almost afraid to displease the nation 
by giving up the prisoners. Moreover, England prepared 
for war instead of asking for her rights in a conciliatory way. 
With great moral courage Lincoln declared that we must 
stick to American principles of International Law, and the 
two Confederate prisoners were given up to England. One 
war at a time, Lincoln said, was enough on his hands, and 
besides, justice and principle both favored his decision. 

607. England’s Attitude Toward the War.—This “ Trent 
affair ” made clear to Lincoln and the North that the ruling 
class of England hoped that the South would win. Even 
before our new minister, Charles Francis Adams, arrived 
in England, the government there acknowledged the bellig¬ 
erency of the Confederacy. 1 This was very offensive to 
the United States Government. The English Government 
might have interfered to stop the war or fully recognized 
the South as a nation had it not been for the strong senti¬ 
ment in favor of the North among the English common 
people, especially the cotton-mill employees, who believed 
that the rights of free labor were involved in the American 
struggle. During most of the war, the menace of European 
interference hung like a cloud over Lincoln’s government. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: (Diplomacy) Adams, Life of Charles Francis Adams. 
Soley, Blockade and the Cruisers. Hart, Life of Chase. Wilson, 
Division and Reunion. Soley, Sailor Boys of ’61. Dodd, Life of 
Jefferson Davis. 


1 By issuing a “proclamation of neutrality” as if two independent 
nations were at war. France took the same step. This gave the Con¬ 
federacy a right to insist that its citizens captured in war should not be 
treated as rebels, but as prisoners of war. That is, they could not be 
tried in the United States courts for treason and, if convicted, be hanged; 
but must be kept in prisons and exchanged for Northerners similarly 
taken by the armies of the Confederacy. 



362 


CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 


CHAPTER XLIII 

THE FIELD OF WAR AND THE EARLY CAMPAIGNS 


608= Advantages in the Field of War.—As the volunteers 

of both the Northern and Southern armies were hurried 
to the front, it was seen that each army would try to pre¬ 
vent the other’s passing either of two great natural lines of 
defense—the Ohio and the Potomac rivers. It was also 
plain that there would be two great fields of war—one 



east and one west of the 
Appalachian system of 
mountains. If the South 
was to be invaded in the 
west, the Ohio, the Cum¬ 
berland, and the Tennes¬ 
see rivers could each be 
used by the Confederates 
as a line of defense. More¬ 
over, the many unsettled 
areas in the South and the 
lack of good roads there, 
either east or west of the 
Alleghanies, would seri¬ 
ously impede the advanc¬ 
ing Northern armies. On 
the other hand, the South 
must hold the Mississippi 
River or lose the aid of Texas and Arkansas and Louisiana. 
Most important of all, it must defend and hold Virginia. 
The capital of the Confederacy was located at Richmond, 
and was thus not only the seat of government of the 
Confederacy, but its military headquarters. 

609. The Bull Run Campaign.—It would have been 
wise for the Northern army, made up of so many untrained 
soldiers, to drill and put off actual fighting as long as pos- 


The United States East of the 
Mississippi 

Showing the field of the Civil War. 








THE FIELD OF WAR AND EARLY CAMPAIGNS 363 

sible. The clamor from the North, however, urging “ on 
to Richmond,” overcame the wisdom of General Scott, who 
was in command of the Union army, and General McDowell, 
who commanded the troops about Washington. The 
Northern army (July, 1861), crossing the Potomac, marched 
upon the Confederates, who were drawn up near Bull Run 
Creek at Manassas Junction. McDowell attacked the Con¬ 
federates, and at first with some success; but when the 
Confederates received re-enforcement, the Union army, un¬ 
disciplined and unexperienced, became panic-stricken and 
started pellmell back to Washington, crowding the roads, a 
hurrying, panting stream of fugitives. 1 It was a day of 
fantastic uniforms; and a strange sight it must have been 
to see this flying host, many wearing the Zouave uniform, 
with their legs in gaudy red or yellow bags and their heads 
in fez caps or turbans, like so many pirates. 

610. McClellan and His Work.—Bad as this defeat and 
disaster was, it was worth while, for it woke the North 
to the serious problem before them. Lincoln turned now 
to General George B. McClellan, who had just been successful 
in a campaign of no great importance in West Virginia. 2 
He took command of the Union army before Washington, 
drilling the soldiers from autumn to spring with great skill, 
until in March, 1862, the Army of the Potomac was & 
splendid body of trained soldiers. The men admired 
McClellan greatly. Because of his small stature, magnetic 
manner, and great self-confidence they called him the 
“ Little Napoleon.” Though he failed, as we shall see, 
it is by no means sure that more experience would not 
have made him a great general. As Sheridan said, his 
fault was he “ never went out to lick anybody, but always 
thought first of keeping from getting licked.” 

1 The Confederates did not pursue, for they were as much disorgan¬ 
ized by victory as the Federals by defeat. 

2 General Scott was too old to be longer regarded as an acting leader, 
though called Lieutenant General. 



364 


CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 


611. Plan of McClellan’s Peninsular Campaign.—While 

McClellan was getting ready to fight, the Confederate 
Government gathered a great army to defend Richmond. 
It was commanded by Generals Joseph E. Johnston, Robert 
E. Lee, and Thomas J. Jackson. 1 Between this army be¬ 
fore Richmond and McClellan’s army before Washington 
were several rivers like the Rappahannock, and a great 
stretch of almost unbroken wilderness. Lincoln wanted 
McClellan to march straight toward Richmond and thus 
keep his army between the Confederates and Washington. 
McClellan wished to avoid a struggle at the rivers and in 
the forests by taking his troops in ships to the peninsula 
between the James and York rivers. As this exposed 
Washington, a small army had to be retained for its defense. 

612. A New Naval Terror.—McClellan’s first need was 
a sure control of the Potomac and Chesapeake, and this 
was won by one of the most dramatic contests of the 
war. The Confederates early in the war (April, 1861) had 
seized Norfolk with its shipyards. The Federals had 
tried to destroy everything of value, but the hull of the old 
frigate Merrimac w r as raised by the Confederates, who 
ingeniously protected the deck and exposed parts of the vessel 
with iron, and renamed it the Virginia. When it was 
fitted with a ram and with steam engines to propel it, this 
first effective armored ship set out on an errand of destruc¬ 
tion (March, 1862). 

It steamed to Fortress Monroe and destroyed two wooden 
frigates. Three more frigates lay at its mercy; but it had 
time enough, and steamed away for some repairs. It w T as 
plain that the day of oak-ribbed and white-sailed war vessels 
was past. 

613. The First Battle between Ironclads.—Lincoln and 
the North were in despair; but like a hero in a drama, the 


1 Known as “Stonewall" Jackson because of a remark that he stood 
with his soldiers like a stone wall resisting the Union attack at Bull Run. 




THE FIELD OF WAR AND EARLY CAMPAIGNS 365 

preserver of the Union’s naval power appeared that very day 
at Fortress Monroe. The little Monitor, “ a cheese box on a 
raft,” a floating iron fort invented by John Ericsson, con¬ 
fronted the Merrimac when it leisurely returned to finish 


The First Battle between Ironclads 
The Monitor and the Merrimac , March 9, 1862. 

its work of destruction. The two iron monsters bombarded 
each other in vain for five hours, and when the disgusted 
Merrimac steamed away, its victorious career was over. 

614. McClellan’s Advance and Retreat.— It was now safe 
to transfer McClellan’s army by water to the peninsula be¬ 
tween the James and York rivers. Slowly he advanced 
up that peninsula toward Richmond, until by the end of 
May he was but ten miles away. On May 31st McClellan 
attacked Johnston at Fair Oaks and on the second day of 
battle forced the Confederate army back. McClellan was 
so near that the fall of Richmond seemed certain, but 
General Robert E. Lee had taken Johnston’s place 1 and, 
calling Jackson from the Shenandoah Valley, he began the 
terrible series of attacks known as the Seven Days’ Bat- 


1 Johnston was wounded at Fair Oaks 





























366 


CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION” 



tie, 1 which forced McClellan to retire to the James. Here 
on the last of the seven days, at Malvern Hill, the forces of 
Lee and Jackson were beaten off. In August, McClellan 
slowly and skillfully withdrew his army to Fortress Monroe. 

615. The Second Battle of Bull Run.—Command of the 
Union troops in northern Virginia was now given to General 
Pope. He marched south from Washington-, but was met 
by Lee and badly beaten on the old field of Bull Run. The 
whole campaign was a failure; Lee had outgeneraled Pope, 
and the one consola- ____ 


tion that the North 
had was Pope’s truth¬ 
ful report after de¬ 
feat: “ The troops 
are in good heart, 
and marched off the 
field without the 
least hurry or con¬ 
fusion. Their con¬ 
duct was very fine.” 

616. Battle of An- 
tietam.—Again Mc¬ 
Clellan was put in 
full command of the 
Army of the Poto¬ 
mac and at once pre¬ 
pared to meet Lee, 
who had crossed the 
Potomac to invade 
Maryland. McClel¬ 
lan was now com¬ 
pelled to defend 


Field of the Eastern Campaigns of 
the Civil War 


Washington as Lee had a few months earlier defended Rich¬ 
mond. At Antietam Creek, McClellan attacked the strongly 


1 June 26th to July 2d, 1862. 





FIGHTING IN THE WEST 


367 


posted Confederate army, and the two armies joined in one 
of the fiercest battles of the war. The Union loss was about 
12,000 men; the Confederates lost about 11,000; and Lee had 
to give up the invasion of Maryland. Lincoln thought 
Lee’s army should not have been allowed to escape, and 
when he made good his retreat into Virginia, McClellan was 
removed from command and General Burnside was put 
in his place. 

617. Fredericksburg.—Burnside was all too well aware 
of the criticism of McClellan for not fighting vigorously, 
and when he found Lee in a strong position on the heights 
which rise steeply behind Fredericksburg, on the southern 
bank of the Rappahannock, he began an impossible assault. 
His men had to cross the river and climb the hill facing a 
murderous fire which mowed them down by thousands. 
When human endurance failed, they turned back across 
the river, having lost nearly 13,000 men to but 4,000 of the 
enemy. Burnside was removed and “ Fighting Joe ” Hooker 
placed in command of the army. The invasion of Virginia 
and the conquest of the South looked like an impossible task 
at the close of 1862. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: Lodge and Roosevelt, Hero Tales from American His¬ 
tory. Wilson, Division and Reunion. Fiske, Mississippi Valley in 
the Civil War. Coffin, Marching to Victory, Battles and Leaders of 
the Civil War. Dodge, Bird’s Eye View of Our Civil War. 

Sources: Ilart, Source Book. Hart, American History Told ly 
Contemporaries. Hart, Source Readers , No. IV. 


CHAPTER XLIV 
FIGHTING IN THE WEST 

618. Attitude of Western Border States.—While the 
Northern and Southern armies were struggling in the East 
about Richmond and Washington, a like struggle was going 


368 


CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 


on in the West for the possession of the Cumberland and 
Tennessee rivers and the Mississippi. During 1861, fighting 
was sharp in Missouri between the two factions of the 
state, one for secession, one against. A convention at last 
voted by a large majority to keep the state in the Union, 
and Union armies helped to keep it so. Lincoln, in his 
attitude toward slavery, had taken great care not to offend 
the people of Missouri and he took the same care in Ken¬ 
tucky. With great tact he won that state to favor the 
Union cause and at last, by the fall of 1861, the Union party 
there was in full control of the Kentucky government. 
Only then did Union troops take upon themselves the task 
of driving out the Confederate army. 

619. The Situation in the West. — At the end of 1861 
Generals Halleck and Buell commanded the Union troops in 
the West. Under Halleck, and stationed at Cairo, was Gen¬ 
eral U. S. Grant, who had been trained at West Point and 
had fought in the Mexican War. A quiet, modest, little man, 
he had real genius. Planning his work carefully, he fought his 
men obstinately, coolly, and with great skill. These leaders 
began to move their troops in the winter, aiming to open 
the river routes which led to the southwest. A glance 
at the map will show what an advantage the rivers were 
to the Northern forces in their invasion of the southwestern 
states. Troops could be conveyed up and down these 
rivers easily and rapidly, and their supplies could be quickly 
brought to them. Seeing this advantage, the National 
Government made great efforts to fit out gunboats that 
would be of service on these western waters. 

620. Efforts to Recover Kentucky.—Early in 1862 a plan 
was made to take eastern Kentucky from the Confederates. 
To that end the Northern government planned to attack 
Forts Henry and Donelson, the former on the Tennessee, 
the latter on the Cumberland River. By taking these the 
Confederate line could be broken at the center. Flag Officer 
Foote, with a number of gunboats, carried up the Tennessee 


FIGHTING IN THE WEST 


369 


an army of seventeen thousand men. These troops were 
under command of General Grant. The usefulness of the 
new gunboat was thus put to the test. 

621. Forts Henry and Donelson (February, 1862).—After 
the army was landed, the boats attacked Fort Henry, but 
their task was short, as most of the Confederate force had 
been withdrawn to Fort Donelson, eleven miles distant. 
Grant then marched his army to the Cumberland, where 



Field of the Western Campaigns of the Civil War 


he attacked Fort Donelson with a force scarcely sufficient 
for the purpose. More troops soon came to his aid, how¬ 
ever, and the gunboats, too, were soon on hand to strengthen 
his attack. The effort of the garrison to escape by breaking 
through the Union line failed. When assaulted by the 
Union troops, the fort surrendered. The Union victory 
was an important one, for the main line of the Confederate 
defense was broken. Early in the spring New Madrid and 












370 


CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 


Island No. 10, Confederate posts on the Mississippi River, 
were taken by Flag Officer Foote and General Pope. New 
Orleans was also captured by Admiral Farragut. 

622. Battle of Shiloh or Pittsburg Landing.—Following the 
victory at Donelson, the main body of Grant’s army, nearly 
forty thousand men, was at Pittsburg Landing on the Ten¬ 
nessee, while General Buell was marching across the country 
to its aid. A strong Confederate army was gathered at 
Corinth, Mississippi. Suddenly, before Buell arrived, the 
Confederate troops attacked Grant. The battle began on 
Sunday morning (April 6, 1862) and raged furiously the 
whole day, the Union forces being driven back about a mile 
during the day. Before the next morning the tables were 
turned by the arrival of Buell, and the Confederates were 
driven in confusion from the field. 

623. Memphis Taken.—The Federal army then took 
Corinth and the second chief line of the Confederate defense 
was broken. Next Memphis fell, and Union gunboats 
could push down the Mississippi as far as Vicksburg. The 
victories of the Western army cheered loyal hearts of the 
North as no other events of the war had done. 

624. What Is to be Done with Slavery ?—The campaign of 
1863, however, was to bring new hope to the nation. But 
before relating the military events of that year we should 
notice some political events that gave new character and 
meaning to the war. When the flag was fired upon, the 
North had rushed to arms with the one thought that the 
Union must be preserved. But as the months went by it was 
felt by many that slavery, which had driven the two sec¬ 
tions apart, must be done away with as the result of the war. 

625. Lincoln and Slavery.—President Lincoln hated 
slavery and hoped for the day when the nation should be 
rid of it. At first, however, he avoided any act that would 
make the war seem to be an attack upon slavery. He 
understood, as few did, how strong a race prejudice there 
was in the North against the negro. That must be con- 


FIGHTING IN THE WEST 


371 


sidered as well as the feeling in favor of emancipation. 
The border states, too, must be regarded, and this region 
was, of course, opposed to abolition. Slavery, Lincoln 
clearly saw, could be abolished only by saving the Union, 
and he bent everything to that end. Day by day he held 
back the excited abolition sentiment, telling everybody that 
first the Union must be preserved. 

626. Negro Slaves “Contraband of War.”—But events 
w r ere taking place which would make the freeing of the 
slaves the reasonable thing for Lincoln to do. Early in the 
war many slaves had escaped to the Union lines, and when 
a Confederate demanded his runaway slaves as his legal 
right under the Fugitive Slave Act, the Union General 
Butler refused on the ground that the slaves were “ contra¬ 
band of war.” 1 Lincoln liked this idea, and Butler’s prac¬ 
tice became the common one. Then Lincoln got Congress 
to agree to furnish money to help pay for the loss, if any 
state would abolish slavery; and he urged the border slave 
states to provide for gradual emancipation on this plan. 
They refused, however, to listen or to take a single step 
to that end. But the antislavery sentiment grew apace in 
the North, pressing Lincoln to act. 

627. Emancipation Proclamation.—The President pa¬ 
tiently bided his time. About midsummer (1862), however, 
he drew up a draft of a proclamation for emancipation, 
which he soon after read to his Cabinet. He did not ask 
the members’ opinions. The measure was a war measure, 
he said, and he, as commander in chief, would shoulder the 
whole responsibility. It was a notable scene. There sat a 
quiet man, bred in such poverty as we can scarcely dream of 
—a man without schooling, who from the simple life among 
the plain people of the great valley had learned lessons 
of faith and justice—a clean, clear soul that saw the truth 

1 Many things useful to the enemy, supplies, ammunition, etc., are 
called contraband of war, and such material may be seized and confis¬ 
cated. 




372 


CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 


bravely and knew his duty. In a few brief sentences, he 
told his intention to strike the shackles from four million 
slaves, to do alone the greatest act done on the American 
continent since the days of the Federal Convention. 


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Cc9T*X^ a 01 «/* •€ t ^ LyS*Ji& 

p>x> G^cstr cnr try ct+y,' 

tjf Jsfev*(l jX* u*y 
&-cXZ.o-4j' 

Facsimile of a Portion of the Emancipation Proclamation, in 

Lincoln’s Handwriting 


628. Lincoln Waits for Victory.—It seemed wise to 
delay the publication of the Emancipation Proclamation 
until the Union forces had won a victory, lest the proclama¬ 
tion “ be viewed,” as Seward said, “ as the last measure of 
an exhausted government, a cry for help.” The proper 
time came, Lincoln decided, after Lee was beaten back at 
Antietam. “ When the rebel army was at Frederick,” 







CAMPAIGNS OF 1863-1865 


373 


Lincoln said, “ I determined, as soon as it should be driven 
out of Maryland, to issue a proclamation of emancipation 
such as I thought most likely to be useful. I said nothing 
to anyone; but I made a promise to myself and to my 
Maker. The rebel army is now driven out, and I am going 
to fulfill my promised 

629. Publication of the Proclamation.—The famous Proc¬ 
lamation was issued September 22, 1862. At that time 
it merelv warned the inhabitants of the states in rebellion 

%s 

that unless they should give up the war before the first day 
of January, 1863, he would declare their slaves free. Of 
course, 'the Southern people paid no heed, and so, on the 
appointed day, the final Proclamation was issued. Slavery 
and freedom were now plainly pitted against each other. 
Though the Proclamation covered not the whole South, but 
only the states or the parts of states where the people were 
in rebellion, Northern success would now mean the complete 
extinction of slavery everywhere in the Union. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: Sparhawk, Life of Lincoln for Boys. Nicolay, Boys’ 
Life of Lincoln. Fiske, Mississippi Valley in the Civil War. Lee, 
General Lee. Tarbell, Life of Lincoln. Wilson, General Grant. Wil¬ 
son, Division and Reunion. 

Sources: Hart, American History Told by Contemporaries , IV, 
Hart, Source Book, 300-327. Hart, Source Readers, No. IV. 


CHAPTER XLY 
CAMPAIGNS OF 1863-1865 

630. Summary of the Military Situation.—At the be¬ 
ginning of 1863, the army in the West under Rosecrans 
was near Chattanooga, facing Bragg. Another army 
under Grant was being pushed forward toward Vicksburg. 
In the East, the army, which had fought so bravely, had 
gained little. 


374 CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 

631. Chancellorsville.— In the East the Army of the 
Potomac, now under the command of General Hooker, was 
beaten at Chancellorsville (May, 1863) by the brave Stone¬ 
wall Jackson, who, however, was accidentally shot by his 
own men—a terrible loss to the South. Hooker was now 
removed and General Meade given command. 

632. Gettysburg.— Lee, again assuming the offensive, 
crossed the Potomac and marched north with the Con- 



The Battle op Gettysburg 

The attack of the Louisiana Tigers on a battery of the eleventh corps. 
From a contemporary illustration in Harper's Weekly. 


federate army into southern Pennsylvania. The Northern 
army met him at Gettysburg. There (July 1-3) was fought 
one of the most stubborn and bloody battles in all history. 
Lee’s army, lately victorious and feeling sure of success, 
attacked the Union forces, which had taken a strong posi¬ 
tion south of the town. The determination and splendid 
valor of the Confederates, especially as shown in the famous 






















CAMPAIGNS OF 1863-1865 


375 


charge led by Pickett, will never be forgotten, but it 
was in vain. Meade commanded well, and his soldiers 
fought with a bravery and steadfastness that was a match 
for the splendid dash of the Southerners. The Confederates 
lost over 20,000 men in killed, wounded, and missing, and 
the Federal army lost 23,000 out of their 90,000. 

Lee retreated to the south of the Potomac. His invasion 
of the North had failed, and the attempt was never made 
again. Gettysburg, and the success at Vicksburg next to be 
told, may be taken as the turning point of the Civil War 
•—one of the great turning points, indeed, in history. From 
this moment the fortunes of the Confederacy waned rapidly. 

633. Vicksburg.—Early in 1863 Grant in the West had 
determined that Vicksburg must be taken. He patiently 
made his preparations with all his wonted care. First, he 
outgeneraled and drove back into the town the Confederate 
forces under General Pemberton. Then repeated assaults 
were made upon the defensive works of the town. When 
these failed, Grant determined to lay regular siege. The 
town was soon hemmed in and starvation threatened it. 
After an heroic resistance Pemberton surrendered, and on 
July 4th the Stars and Stripes floated over the defenses of 
Vicksburg. The Mississippi was open; “ the Father of 
Waters rolled unvexed to the sea,” as Lincoln declared. 

634. Chickamauga.—Rosecrans, as we have seen, was 
facing Bragg not far from Chattanooga. Toward the end 
of the summer the Confederates were forced to give up 
Chattanooga, and the Federal troops took possession of 
the place. But the Southern army was not yet beaten. 
In September they turned upon the Northern army at 
Chickamauga, south of Chattanooga, and there (September 
19-20, 1863) a most bloody battle was fought. The Union 
army was defeated. 

Only the splendid leadership of General Thomas, com¬ 
manding the Union left, saved a complete rout. His troops 
fought with grim steadfastness and were handled io. a 


376 


CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 


masterly manner. Though Thomas’ force was surrounded 
on three sides, the brave and furious attacks of the Con¬ 
federates could not drive him from the field. “No more 
splendid spectacle appears in the annals of war than this 
heroic stand of Thomas in the midst of a routed army. . . . 
Slowly riding up and down the lines, with unruffled counte¬ 
nance and cheery word, it is his own invincible soul which 
inspires his men for the work they have to do.” 1 When the 
evening came, Thomas withdrew his forces and joined the 
defeated right and center. The Union troops, however, were 
for some time in danger. Chattanooga, indeed, remained 
in their hands, but they were sorely pressed by the Con¬ 
federates who strove to gain possession of the town. 

635. Chattanooga (November 23-25,1863).—The command 
of the army at Chattanooga was now placed in Grant’s hands. 
Bragg, in command of the Con¬ 
federate forces, held a position 
on the high ground south and 
east of the city from which it 
seemed impossible to dislodge 
him. Grant, nevertheless, made 
the attempt, after placing Sher¬ 
man in command of the left, 

Thomas of the center, and 
Hooker of the right. When the 
battle began, Sherman pushed 
eastward and then south against 
Missionary Ridge. Hooker’s 
men in the famous “ Battle 
Above the Clouds” on Lookout Mountain (November 24), 
forced back the left of the Confederate line. 

On the second day Thomas was ordered to attack the 
center on Missionary Ridge. So eager were the troops, 
that they seized the lower earthworks, then charged up the 

1 Dodge: “ Bird’s-eye View of the Civil War,” p. 281. Thomas well 
earned his name—“ The Rock of Chickamauga.” See map, page 382. 







CAMPAIGNS OF 1S63-1865 


377 


slope under murderous fire to the very mouths of the guns, 1 
and swept the Confederates from their works. The field 
was won, and Thomas’ men had made one of the most 
dashing and brilliant charges ever recorded. 

636. The Period of Doubt.—When the war began, it was 
with volunteer soldiers that the armies were filled, but soon 
it became necessary to use more forceful methods of filling 
the ranks. The year 1862, as we know, was an unsuccess¬ 
ful one for the North, and though most of the Northern 
people were willing to support the war, there was a large 
number of fault-finders. Each defeat of the Union forces 
was held up as proof that the South could never be 
conquered. 

637. Drafting Soldiers.—In some parts of the North vol¬ 
unteering nearly ceased, though there was still enthusiasm 

and loyalty. Men felt 
that the government 
should get men in the 
businesslike fashion 
used by other govern¬ 
ments. It was not 
right to rely upon 
popular enthusiasm, 
which led the gener¬ 
ous and loyal to enlist 
while those who were 
selfish stayed at home 
and found fault. Con¬ 
gress, therefore, passed an act providing for “enrolling and 
calling out the national forces.” Hereafter, when the quota 

1 “The slopes are hard to climb; strength and ardor are not the same 
In all the assailants. But if the ways differ somewhat, there are seen 
no laggards among them. The boldest of them gather around the 
flags, each of which they pass from hand to hand as fast as one pays 
with his life for the honor of holding it a moment.” “History of the 
Civil War in America,” by the Comte de Paris, vol. iv., p. 300. 



Drafting Soldiers 

From a contemporary illustration. 











CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 


378 

of a given district was not filled by volunteers, drafts were 
to be made from the enrolled citizens. 

638. Draft Riots.—The draft met with much opposition in 
some sections, and in July a riot broke out in New York. For 
four days a mob terrified the city. Officers trying to quell 
the riot, and even innocent citizens, were killed. Negroes were 
set upon because their race was regarded as the cause of the 
war and some of them were slain. Even property was 
ruthlessly burned. The National Government sent troops 
into the city and with firm hand put down the riot. Nearly 
a thousand of the rioters were killed, indeed, before order 
was completely restored. 

639. Grant Made Leader of the American Armies.—Early 

in 1864 Grant was made lieutenant general and given com¬ 
mand of all the armies of the United States. Having made 
up his mind to conduct the war in the East himself, he 
called upon his tried friend, Sherman, to take charge of 
the army in the West. 

640. Battles of the Wilderness (May 5-9, 1864).—Grant 

now began his “ hammering campaign/’ the purpose being 
to push steadily forward to Richmond. As he was moving 
cautiously southward, Lee attacked him in the wilderness 1 
where the Confederates knew the ground well and Grant did 
not. The battle was indecisive and both armies suffered 
terrible losses. Grant, nevertheless, ordered his army for¬ 
ward to Spottsylvania. There ensued another fierce battle, 
Grant stubbornly hammering, with some success, but with 
heavy losses. The North and the army realized that at last 
a general was in command who had made up his mind to 
fight the war to a finish. 

641. Cold Harbor.— Grant, unflinching, pushed on to¬ 
ward Richmond. At last (June 2, 1864) the two armies 
clashed again at Cold Harbor. The charge of Grant’s 

1 A low forest or thicket of undergrowth and second growth trees 
extending for miles, and intersected by a few roads by which troops 
could be moved. 



CAMPAIGNS OF 1863-1865 


379 


eager troops was glorious, but the slaughter made men 
shudder. With all the valor of the Union troops, they 
were unable to drive the Southern veterans from their 
position. 

642. Grant Moves on to Besiege Richmond.—Grant, 
repulsed at Cold Harbor but not beaten—for he did not 








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OF THE WAR 

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LIMIT OF TERRY. GAINED 



BY JAN.1, 1864 

SIGN OF BLOCKADE 


know how to be beaten—shifted his position somewhat. 
He crossed the James and placed his army opposite Peters¬ 
burg, a strategic point of great importance to the Con¬ 
federates, because it protected the communications of 
Richmond. The Union army took the outer works of the 

















380 


CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 


fortifications with heavy losses. When it was seen that 
direct attack would not do, the army settled down for a 
siege. 1 

643. Sheridan in the Shenandoah Valley.—Grant was 
now anxious to cut off Lee’s communications with the rest 
of the South. Earlier in the summer General Sheridan 
with cavalry had ridden completely around Lee’s army. 
He was later (August, 1864) ordered to take charge in 
the Shenandoah Valley, whither General Early, a bold and 
able Confederate leader, had retired after having frightened 
Washington by a daring raid. Grant told Sheridan to 
“push things hard,” and he did so. Soon the valley was 
at his mercy. It was so devastated that it was said: “If 
a crow wants to fly down the valley he must take his 
provisions with him.” All barns and mills were burned and 
the cattle and sheep driven off. It could no longer serve 
as a highway for those raids which had frightened the 
people in Washington. 

644. Cedar Creek and Sheridan’s Ride, October, 1864.— 

There were trying moments, however. In October, Early 
surprised the Union forces at Cedar Creek and furiously 
attacked them while Sheridan was at Winchester, some 
miles away. The Union troops had begun a retreat and 
there was danger of a rout, when Sheridan rode upon the 
field, and by his magnetic presence cheered the troops to 
new efforts. Riding at full gallop, he called out to the 
straggling fugitives: “ Face the other way, boys! We are 
going back to our camps! We are going to lick them out 
of their boots!” And so they did. 


1 We get but scant idea of the horror of the war unless we stop to real¬ 
ize the losses of those awful days. In five weeks Grant lost sixty thou¬ 
sand men. Anxiously each morning father, mother, wife, brother, and 
sister in the North scanned the papers with hope of decisive victory and 
with dread of finding the name of their loved one in the long column of 
missing. Men who speak blithely of war should go back and try to live 
through the horror of the spring of 1864. 




CAMPAIGNS OF 1863-1865 


381 


645. Farragut Takes Mobile, August, 1864.—During this 
struggle on the land, there had been exciting events at sea. 
Mobile had long remained in the hands of the Confederates, 
and was a favorite port for blockade runners. The task of 
keeping ships from going in and out of its bay had proved 
practically impossible. In 1864 it was one of the openings 
through which cotton could be exported, or supplies brought 
in to sustain the hard-pressed Confederacy. The harbor 
was strongly defended by two forts, but Admiral Farragut 
determined to lead his ships by them and attack the fleet 
inside. Lashed to the rigging of his flagship, where he 
could see all that was going on, Farragut commanded his 
fleet. The Confederate gunboats, led by the iron ram, the 
Tennessee , were beaten and the forts captured with the 
aid of the Union land force. The capture of Mobile sealed 
up the whole South. 

646. The South Preys on Northern Commerce.—The 

Confederate Government early in the war had had several 
war vessels fitted out in British ports. Charles Francis 
Adams, our minister in England, told the English Government 
that these vessels were building, and asked that they be 
forbidden to sail. The government, however, acted slowly 
and they got safely off to sea. One of them assumed the 
name Alabama, and began, as a privateer, to prey upon 
the American commerce. She did immense damage, captur¬ 
ing and burning Northern merchantmen. At last, after 
being pursued for many months, the Alabama was found 
at Cherbourg, France, by the United States ship Kearsarge, 
and in answer to a challenge, came out to fight. At the end 
of an hour the Alabama struck her colors and almost im¬ 
mediately sank. Some of her men escaped to an English 
vessel which stood near by. The A labama alone had burned 
as many as fifty-seven merchantmen, while other vessels of 
the same sort, especially the Florida and the Georgia, had like¬ 
wise done much damage. Our Government filed its protest 
with the English Government, asserting that these vessels 


382 


CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 


never should have been allowed to go to sea when it was 
well known for what purpose they were being fitted out. 

647. Sherman Takes Atlanta.—During the summer of 1864 
a very active campaign was fought in the W est. Sherman 
commanded there an army of one hundred thousand men 
which lay just south of Chattanooga facing the Confederates, 



Field op the Last Campaigns of the Civil War and the Line op 

Sherman’s March 


who were at Dalton in the northwestern part of Georgia. 
By skilful strategy, Sherman forced the Confederates back 
to Atlanta, which was for a time defended admirably. The 
Union army won continually, the men fighting like the 
seasoned veterans that they were. In September, Hood, 
who had been placed in command of the Confederates, 
abandoned Atlanta, and the Northern troops marched in. 












CAMPAIGNS OF 1863-1865 


383 


648o The March to the Sea.—General Hood now marched 
his army toward Tennessee, as if to overthrow Thomas 
and to cut off Sherman from the North and his supplies. 
But Sherman determined upon a plan to cut the Confederacy 
in two. He concluded that if he himself marched on and 
left the Confederate army behind him, General Thomas 
could defend Tennessee and Kentucky. He thereupon 
made ready for his famous “ march to the sea.” Leaving 
his base of supplies, he marched across Georgia with over 
sixty thousand rugged veterans. A belt of sixty miles 
in width was swept bare of food for either man or beast. 
Mills and houses and barns were burned, locomotives 
were wrecked, rails twisted, and all communications 
broken between the two parts of the Confederacy on 
either side. Heartrending as the destruction was to the 
impoverished dwellers in that region, it was one of the ter¬ 
rible deeds which war makes necessary. Sherman reached 
the sea early in December, and December 22d he sent 
Lincoln, by telegram, a Christmas gift of the city of Savan¬ 
nah. 1 

649. Thomas Crushes Hood.—Meanwhile Thomas skill¬ 
fully handled Hood, whom Sherman had left in his 
rear. Hood marched to the North against Thomas, 
whose main army was at Nashville. In spite of orders 
from Washington and demands from Grant that an 
advance be made, Thomas cautiously took all the time 
he wished, and got his forces into full readiness for 
battle. He then turned upon Hood at Nashville (1864) 


1 This march through the very heart of the Confederacy made it 
plain that the struggle could not last long. Sherman had gone 
through the heart of Georgia, and when he reached Savannah, a 
great load was taken from the anxious North. Grant wrote him: “I 
never had a doubt of the result. When apprehensions for your safety 
were expressed by the President, I assured him with the army you had, 
and you in command of it, there was no danger, but you would strike 
bottom on salt water some place.” 



384 CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 

and crushed him. 1 The war was then practically over in 
the West. 


Suggested Readings 

Histories: Wilson, Division and Reunion. Solev, Sailor Boys of 
} 61. Soley, Admiral Porter. Mahan, Gulf and Inland Waters. 
Champlin, Young Folks’ History of the War for the Union. Coffin, 
Redeeming the Republic. Fiske, Mississippi Valley in the Civil War. 
Coffin, Freedom Triumphant. Dodd, Jefferson Davis. 

Sources: Hart, American History Told by Contemporaries , IV. 
Hart, Source Readers , No. IV. 


CHAPTER XLVI 

POLITICAL CRISIS.—THE END OF THE WAR 

650. Lincoln’s Troubles.—President Lincoln had had 
political as well as military difficulties during the summer 
of 1864. Though it was clear that Grant’s relentless 
campaign was bringing the Confederacy to an end, Lincoln 
was attacked by unfriendly critics. Some men of the 
President’s own party were opposed to him, and plans 
were being made to defeat him in the coming election. All 
through his term he had been troubled by political quarrels, 
but in the spring and early summer of 1864 the danger was 
greater than ever. 

651. Secretary Chase Resigns.—Secretary Chase, among 
others, wanted to be President, and many of Lincoln’s 
opponents favored the secretary’s ambitions. But this ap¬ 
proval was confined largely to the politicians, while the com¬ 
mon people were behind Lincoln. They liked him and felt 
his worth. Chase had the wisdom, finally, to see that his 


1 Thomas was a Virginian, but had refused to follow his state into 
secession. He was one of the most successful generals of the war, 
shrewd, careful, thorough. He knew not defeat, and always fought 
with the utmost coolness, precision, and energy. He was modest and 
unassuming, yet few were so competent to command. 




POLITICAL CRISIS.—THE END OF THE WaR 385 

candidacy was hopeless. His relations with the President, 
however, became so strained that he gave up his office, 1 
to William Pitt Fessenden. 

652. Political Campaign of 1864.—When the Republican 
Convention met, Lincoln was nominated unanimously on 
the first ballot and the wish of the nation triumphed over 
the fault-finding of quarrelsome leaders and critical news¬ 
papers. In choosing the Vice President, it was thought 
wise to nominate a War Democrat—some one who had 
belonged to the Democratic Party before the war, but who 
was now working with the Republicans to preserve the 
Union. The choice of the convention, therefore, fell upon 
Andrew Johnson, of Tennessee. A platform calling for the 
complete suppression of the rebellion announced “ that 
as slavery was the cause and now constitutes the strength 
of this rebellion, and as it must be always and everywhere 
hostile to the principles of republican government, justice 
and the national safety demand its utter and complete 
extirpation from the soil of the republic.” 

653. The Democratic Platform.—The Democratic Party 
nominated General George B. McClellan for the presidency. 
The party platform insisted that “ immediate efforts be made 
for a cessation of hostilities w r ith a view to an ultimate 
convention of all the states, or other peaceable means, 
to the end that at the earliest practicable moment peace 
may be restored on the basis of the Federal union of the 
states.” 

654. Lincoln Elected.—During the presidential campaign 
the Republicans 2 felt that everything was at stake. In 
the midst of the political struggle, Sherman won his great 
victory over Hood at Atlanta. His telegram, “ Atlanta is 

1 Lincoln’s greatness is nowhere better shown than by his making 
Chase Chief Justice after he gave up the secretaryship of the treasury. 

2 Perhaps we might more properly call them the Union Party, for 
there were many who, after the danger of disunion was over, went back 
into the Democratic Party. 



386 


CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 


ours, and fairly won/’ gave new courage and great joy. 
Lincoln was elected by a large majority. 

655. Thirteenth Amendment Proposed.—It will be re¬ 
membered that the Emancipation Proclamation was only 
a war measure—like any other confiscation of property 
and it freed only such slaves as lived in those parts of the 
South then at war with the National Government. It did 
not destroy slavery in the other Southern states. A vote 
on the question of submitting a constitutional amendment 
abolishing slavery everywhere was taken in Congress early 
in 1864, but failed. After the election, however, abolition 
got new strength and the resolution for the amendment 
was carried. Lincoln rejoiced that the “ great job ” was 
ended, as he expressed it in his homely way. 

656. Slavery Ended.— Still, however, the ratification by 
three fourths of the states was needed 1 and that was finally 
secured. The amendment provided that “ neither slavery 
nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for 
crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, 
shall exist within the United States or any place subject 
to their jurisdiction.” Thus, the country was forever rid 
of the great evil of slavery. The hope of the future was 
for fellow feeling between North and South, now that one 
of the worst causes of enmity and division was to be no 
more. 

657. Lee in Great Danger.—While giving our attention 
to political matters, we have delayed the story of the military 
events of the winter and spring of 1865. When Sherman 
left Savannah and marched North through the Carolinas, 
he was harassed by the Confederates under Johnston, but 
his advance was not seriously hindered. Grant, meanwhile, 
held Lee at Richmond and Petersburg. The Confederates 
grew daily weaker, and the end seemed near at hand. Lee 

1 This was done in the course of the year. In December, 1865, a 
proclamation was issued declaring that the Thirteenth Amendment was 
added to the Constitution. 



POLITICAL CRISIS.—THE END OF THE WAR 387 

had a plan to push southward and unite with Johnston, 
hoping thus to crush Sherman before Grant could get to 
his aid. Grant, handling his immense army with great 
ability, watched with caution and anxiety, while Lee, 
fighting deliberately and with his usual skill, sought to 
escape the deadly toils of the Union army winding ever 
more closely about Richmond. 

658. Lee Surrenders to Grant.—At length, by a night 
march (April 2-3, 1865) Lee slipped away. Grant entered 
Richmond and then began a hot pursuit. The brave Con¬ 
federates, ragged, starving, and disheartened, made their 



Facsimile o-f the Last Lines of Grant’s Letter to Lee 

way westward, harassed at every step by the pursuing 
Union cavalry. The only escape was by way of the narrow 
strip of land between the Appomattox and James rivers. 
When Sheridan’s cavalry planted themselves across that 
route Lee’s army was surrounded. On the 9th of April 
Lee surrendered. Grant, generous and wise, granted terms 
deserved by a brave foe. The Confederates were released 
on parole, “ not to take up arms against the Government 
of the United States until properly exchanged the 



388 


CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 


officers and men were to return to their homes, 1 “not 
to be disturbed by the United States authority so long as 
they observe their paroles and the laws in force where they 
reside.” Grant’s generosity gave to the North a timely 
lesson of wise self-restraint in the hour of victory. Johnston 
surrendered to Sherman at Durham, North Carolina, on the 
26th of April. 

659. End of the War.— The greatest civil war in history 
was at an end. The North, in order to crush the South, 
had been forced to raise an army as large as the fabulous 
host of Xerxes. The South had fought with a spirit, a 
heroism, and a courage that causes us to forget the quarrel 
and prompts us only to remember with pride that the men 
of both sections are now brethren of a common country. 
Grant’s words in addressing his former comrades in arms 
were wisely chosen: “ Let them hope for perpetual peace and 
harmony with that enemy whose manhood, however mis¬ 
taken the cause, drew forth such Herculean deeds of valor.” 

660. Hard Times in the South.—The efforts of the South 
to sustain the war had been heroic. We must recall that 
they had few factories of any kind. The very arms with 
which they fought had to be smuggled through the blockade 
or wearily brought across Texas from Mexico, and day by 
day the inclosing toils of the Union army and navy made 
that more difficult. Gold and silver money was almost 
unknown and borrowing was practically impossible. Paper 
money, issued by the million dollars, “ payable six months 
after the close of the war,” fell down, down, in value 
as the prospects of the Confederacy grew dimmer. In May, 
1864, a clerk in Richmond entered these prices in his diary, 
“ Boots, two hundred dollars; pantaloons, one hundred 
dollars; . . . flour, two hundred and seventy-five dollars 
per barrel; . . . bacon, nine dollars per pound; . . . 

1 Lee’s farewell to his brave soldiers, “whose very rags are a shining 
honor,” was pathetic in its simplicity. “Men,” he said, “we have 
fought through the war together. I have done the best I could for you. ” 




POLITICAL CRISIS.—THE END OF THE WAR 389 


potatoes, twenty-five dollars per bushel; . . . wood, fifty 
dollars per cord.” 1 

661. The Slavery Burden too Great for the South.—Thus 
it was through actual want that the South was beaten— 
not because the people could not fight, nor because they were 
not willing to bear hardships. History has few examples 
of such brave constancy as that shown by Lee’s men in the 
fearful campaign of 1864-65, when Grant’s terrific hammer¬ 
ing must have convinced them that they could not long 
hold out. Southern women at home on the plantations 
suffered terrible privations with heroic fortitude. It was 
not lack of bravery, skill, or determination that defeated 
the South. It was slavery, an institution which had been 
abandoned by every other equally civilized part of the world. 

662. Cost of Preserving the Union.—The Union was 
saved, but the cost was enormous. Over three hundred 
thousand Northern men gave up their lives for their 
country. 2 The loss of the South can have been but little 
less. From all causes, the nation lost nearly a million of 
able-bodied men. 

663. Conditions in the South.—At the close of the war 

there were over a million men receiving pay in the 
Northern army. The total national debt at the end of the 
war was $2,844,649,626. Yet we do not get an idea of the 
real cost of these four years of destruction, until we remem¬ 
ber that hundreds of thousands of men were taken from pro¬ 
ductive work, to spend their energies in killing their fellows. 

This sacrifice of the North to preserve the Union 
and the Government was great, but the sacrifice of the 
South was greater. She, in behalf of slavery and her 
constitutional principles, offered up her very life. When the 

1 General Gordon, of the Confederate army, used to tell of offering a 
soldier $1,000 for a fine horse he was leading. “Not by a jugful,” re¬ 
plied the soldier, “I just paid $200 for having him curried.” 

2 This does not count the men who died at home as a result of wounds 
received in battle, or as a result of exposure. 




390 


CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 


war ended the whole Southern country was desolate. 
Men and women who had been reared in luxury were reduced 
to poverty. Virginia had been a battlefield for four terrible 
years, and other states fared but little better. When South¬ 
ern soldiers sought their homes, they were met by want and 
desolation. If the buildings had not been destroyed they 
were sadly out of repair, the cattle had been driven off 
by invading armies, the horses and mules had been killed 
in battle, and what money the South had was worthless. 
Only courage equal to that displayed in war could enable 
them to take up the struggle for a livelihood. 

664. Disbanding the Army.—When the Union army of a 
million soldiers was disbanded, the men went quietly back 
to the farm, the counting house, or the workshop. Within 
a few weeks this huge army was absorbed back into the 
body of the people. All the world wondered that there 
was no violence, no license, no rioting. The volunteer 
soldier showed his sense and self-restraint by becoming an 
ordinary citizen once more. 

Suggested Readings 

See Readings suggested for Chapter XLV. 

CHAPTER XLVII 

RECONSTRUCTION 

665. The Assassination of Lincoln.—Just at the moment 
when the wise and large-hearted Lincoln could have been 
of the greatest service to the nation so torn by war, he was 
murdered by Wilkes Booth while sitting in a box at Ford’s 
Theater (April 14, 1865). The man who planned his death 
hoped to plunge the nation’s affairs into confusion, and 
thus give the Confederacy a last chance for life. It was the 
worst of folly; for as many great Southern leaders saw, 1 

1 The Southerners lamented Lincoln’s death, for they had learned 
that there was no hate or malice in him, and that once they were back 




RECONSTRUCTION 


391 



the South needed Lincoln’s mercy and self-control in the 
hour of her defeat. Lincoln’s place was at once taken by 

Andrew Johnson, the Vice- 
President, and public busi¬ 
ness went on as before, ex¬ 
cept that Lincoln, the pru- 
dent-tongued man who did 
not lose his temper, was ex¬ 
changed for Johnson who 
was both passionate and 
hasty of speech. 

666. How Was the South 
to Get Back into the 
Union?—From the mourn¬ 
ful thought of Lincoln’s 
untimely end the country 
turned back to the great 
question of what should 
be done with the conquered 
South and its people. 
How should the Govern¬ 
ment treat the white men 
who had fought to destroy 
the Union? What should be done to provide for the welfare 
of the freed negroes who had never known any more than do 
children what it was to care for themselves? There were 
other questions that troubled men greatly; they did not 
know, for example, whether a Southern state that had tried 
to secede was still a state or not. Some men, indeed, insisted 
that by the attempt at secession the state became a territory 
and was fully under the control of the Federal Government. 


Abraham Lincoln 

From the last portrait taken before his 
assassination. 


in the Union he would be their friend. Indeed, Lincoln only recently- 
had said, “Let us strive to bind up the nation’s wounds, to care for him 
who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow and his orphan—to 
do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among 
ourselves, and with all nations. ” 









392 


CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 


Lincoln had thought there was no use in raising these ques¬ 
tions. The Southern states, he said, were out of the “proper 
practical relations with the Union” and the thing to do 
was to restore that “proper practical relation” as quickly 
as possible. 

667. Lincoln’s Plan.—As early as December, 1863, Lin¬ 
coln had sent forth a proclamation in which he offered pardon 
to all persons, except a few Southern leaders, who would 
swear their allegiance to the United States and obedience to 
the Constitution and the Emancipation Proclamation. When 
one-tenth of the voters in a Southern state had been thus 
pardoned, and had set up a loyal government, republican in 
form, Lincoln proposed to look upon this government as the 
lawful state government. Congress, however, had, under 
the Constitution, the right to refuse to receive senators or 
representatives sent from such a state to Washington. 
Though several states were thus “reconstructed,” Northern 
opinion was against this mild treatment of seceded states. 
Yet a man loved and trusted as was Lincoln might have 
led the people to his view. 

668. Johnson’s Way of Treating the Problems.—When 

Johnson became President, he took up the same plan of 
reconstruction, but as he had himself belonged to the non¬ 
slave-holding class before the war, he was not friendly to 
those who had been of the rich planter class, and so in his 
proclamation (May, 1865) he did not pardon the old 
Southern leaders. On the other hand, he had no special 
interest in protecting the negroes in civil rights. When 
some of the reorganized Southern states passed “vagrancy” 
or “labor-contract” laws to compel the freeclman to work, 
he was little concerned, though the North looked upon this 
forced labor as not unlike slavery. Congress had already 
(March, 1865) created by law a Freedmen’s Bureau which 
was to find work for the negroes, save them from starvation, 
protect them from injustice, and set up schools for them. 
Johnson had little sympathy with this bureau. 


RECONSTRUCTION 393 

669. Struggle between Johnson and Congress.— When 
Congress met in December, 1865, with a Republican ma¬ 
jority, it refused to admit senators and representatives 
from the reconstructed states. 1 This angered Johnson, and 
when Congress passed a law to give more power to the 
Freedmen’s Bureau, he vetoed it. In July Congress passed 
another bill to increase the power of the bureau and to give 
the army power to force obedience to it. This bill Johnson 
also vetoed. Meanwhile, a Civil Rights Bill to protect the 
freedmen by putting them under the care of the Federal 
Government was passed, vetoed, and repassed by a two 
thirds vote which overrode the President’s veto. From 
that time on, Congress and the President were at war. In 
three years Johnson vetoed twenty-one bills, of which Con¬ 
gress passed fifteen over his veto. 

670. Fourteenth Amendment,—To prevent a future Con¬ 
gress from taking away the rights secured by the Civil 
Rights Act, the two Houses proposed the Fourteenth Amend¬ 
ment to the Constitution. This aimed: (1) to prevent the 
states from abridging the rights of citizens either white or 
black; (2) to cut down the representation in Congress of 
any state which denied the right of voting to any male 
citizen twenty-one years old, except for taking part in the 
rebellion; 2 (3) to exclude certain leaders of the Confed¬ 
eracy from office; (4) to guarantee the debt of the United 
States, while all debts incurred by the South in aid of 
insurrection or rebellion were declared void. Except Tennes¬ 
see, every Southern state refused to accept this amendment. 
Only after the most strenuous efforts of Congress was it 
finally carried. 

671. The Plans of Congress.—Congress would not give 

1 Members from the Southern states, it was thought, might defeat the 
will of the Northern members in the work of guarding the negroes’ rights 
and punishing the Southern leaders. 

2 Congress did not wish in 1867 to give suffrage to the negro. But it 
did wish to cut down the representation of Democratic states. 



394 


CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 


up its purpose, as expressed in the Fourteenth Amendment. 
In March, 1867, therefore, a Tenure of Office Act was passed 
over Johnson’s veto with the aim of keeping in office men 
who favored Congress and were opposed to the President. A 
Reconstruction Act, also vetoed, was passed in spite of 
Johnson, and later was amended and made more vigorous. 
In its final form, it organized the seceded states, 1 except 
Tennessee, 2 into military districts, each ruled by a military 
officer in command of soldiers enough to execute his orders. 
While thus ruled the states were to frame new constitutions, 
giving the right to vote to all men, white or black, who for 
one year had been residents and who had not taken part in 
the rebellion. 3 The new voters might elect a new legisla¬ 
ture which must ratify the Fourteenth Amendment. Then 
and only then could their senators and representatives be 
admitted to Congress. 

672. Stevens and Sumner.—The leader in this revengeful 

legislation was Thaddeus Stevens, of Pennsylvania, who 
from his first entrance into Congress (1849) had been the 
deadly enemy of slavery. His wit and readiness and 
singleness of purpose made him one of the greatest debaters 
who ever sat in Congress. He had no sympathy with 
an opponent, but thought all on the other side were scoun¬ 
drels. He was bent on vengeance against the slaveholders 
and “ rebels.” He favored negro suffrage because, as he 
said openly, it would “ continue the Republican ascendency.” 
All the negroes, he was sure, would vote for the party which 
had freed the slaves. To attain his end he bent all the 
power of a keen and logical mind and a sarcastic tongue, 
which everyone dreaded. Sumner, in quite another way, led 
in the Senate toward the same goal as Stevens in the House. 

673. Results of the Vengeful Policy.— The terrible result 
of this vindictive policy, so foreign to the one Lincoln would 

1 Including those reconstructed by Lincoln and Johnson. 

2 Excepted because it had assented to the Fourteenth Amendment. 

* This took the right to vote away from all the old leaders of the South. 




RECONSTRUCTION 


395 


have pursued, was that for a few years the South was ruled 
by the lowest and most ignorant of men. Many teachers 
had been sent South in the wake of the Federal armies to edu¬ 
cate the negroes. 1 Many of the members of the Union League, 
established in the North during the war, also came South, 2 
and began to admit to their secret councils negro members 
who were controlled by white leaders. These white leaders 
and teachers began to instruct the black freedmen to avoid 
the Southern whites as natural enemies, and to look to the 
Northern whites as friends. The Southern whites were 
now chiefly Democrats, because they wished to oppose the 
Republicans. The negroes were taught to hate the Demo¬ 
crats and to look to the Republican Party for promised 
favors, social rights, and a division of the property of South¬ 
ern whites which was to be confiscated. “ Forty acres and 
a mule ” were to be given every negro, the rumor ran. 3 4 Ne¬ 
groes were trained in military drill often after dark, to the 
terror of the whites. By these means the negroes were 
induced to vote the Republican ticket, and under the recon¬ 
struction laws the political power fell wholly into their 
hands and those of the “ carpetbaggers/ M as the white 
leaders from the North were called. 

674. Slaves of Yesterday, Rulers To-day.—To under¬ 
stand the sinister meaning of this political control, we must 
remember that up to the time of the war the negro slaves 
had little or no education, no experience of any kind in 
politics. They had never cared for themselves, but had 
been cared for like children. They had never bought for 

1 This work was under the control of the Freedmen’s Bureau. 

2 Many Southern whites in the mountain districts also joined this 
league. The league was originally organized to work for the preser¬ 
vation of the Union, but its high purpose became in time corrupted. 

3 Rascally sharpers swindled many negroes by selling them tri- 
colored stakes with which to stake off their forty acres. 

4 This name was given in contempt because it was said that these 
men carried all their possessions in carpetbags. The Southern white 
men who aided the “ carpetbaggers” were called “ scalawags.” 



396 


CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 


themselves even a pair of shoes, and even their daily food 
had been provided for them. Now, with little or no training 
these men, but a day removed from slavery and often misled 
by unprincipled “ carpetbaggers/ 7 became the rulers of the 
South. Men without a dollar of taxable property passed 
the laws taxing the rich planters to such an extent that tax¬ 
ation became confiscation. They furnished the statehouse 
with $1,000 mirrors, $200 clocks, richly decorated cuspidors, 
$200 crimson plush sofas. They furnished themselves with 
the finest liquors and cigars. 1 For their sweethearts they 
purchased—with state funds—jewelry and parasols, ladies’ 
hoods, and even hooks and eyes. War itself had hardly 
been so destructive of the rights of property holders as was 
this aping of government. 

675. The South Seeks Escape from Rule by Former Slaves. 

—The white men of the South, unable to act in the open 
because the negro politicians were protected by the United 
States soldiers, resorted to secret means of frightening the 
negro voters. The Ku Klux Klan was organized, every 
member of which swore by the terrible oath of the Invisible 
Empire, or the White Brotherhood, or Pale Faces, to “for¬ 
ever maintain and contend that intelligent white men shall 
govern this country.” 2 Masked men in hideous disguises, 
with horns and wings and ghostly trappings, rode through 
the night threatening the negroes, whipping and even shoot¬ 
ing their white leaders. As this practice grew, Congress 
passed the Force Acts (1870-71) in a vain effort to quell 
this intimidation by trials in United States courts and by 
the use of soldiers. 

1 In one session the South Carolina Legislature spent $125,000 for 
“refreshments.” 

2 The officers of the Ku Klux Klan consisted of a Grand Wizard of 
the Empire and his ten Genii; a Grand Dragon of the Realm and his 
eight Hydras; a Grand Titan of the Dominion and his six Furies; a 
Grand Giant of the Province and his four Goblins; a Grand Cyclops 
of the den and his four Night Hawks; a Grand Mage, a Grand Monk, a 
Grand Scribe, a Grand Exchequer, a Grand Turk, and a Grand Sentinel. 




RECONSTRUCTION 


397 


676. President Johnson Impeached 0 —Meanwhile, the 
quarrel between President Johnson and Congress had led 
to an attempt to deprive Johnson of his office. He was 
accused of refusing to carry out the laws 
of Congress which his inauguration oath 
bound him to execute. Especially did 
he refuse to obey the Tenure of Office Act, 
which required the Senate’s assent to 
removals from office. Without their 

• consent he removed his Secretary of War, 

Stanton, for disobedience to him, and 
thereupon the House of Representatives, 
following the form provided by the Con¬ 
stitution, impeached the President, and 
his trial was held in the Senate with Chief 
Justice Chase of the Supreme Court pre¬ 
siding. There were a number of charges, A Member of the 
but the test vote was taken on the * VQ Klux K lan 
strongest case relating to the removal of Stanton. The 
necessary two-thirds vote required by the Constitution 
for impeachment failed. A change of a single vote, 
however, would have established the dangerous precedent 
of removing a President because he quarreled with Con¬ 
gress. 

677. Election of 1868.—While the President and Congress 
were thus wrestling for supremacy, the election of 1868 was 
deciding who was to be Johnson’s successor. Horatio Sey¬ 
mour was nominated by the Democrats, and General Grant 
by the Republicans. The latter’s great military fame gave 
him great advantage. He was elected, having two hundred 
and fourteen electoral votes to eighty for Seymour. 

678. The Fifteenth Amendment.—Just before Grant’s 
inauguration the Republicans, taking courage from their 
victory, sent out to the states for approval, the Fifteenth 
Amendment to the Constitution. The last amendment 
had left the states still empowered to say who should or 






398 


CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 


should not vote, 1 but the new one provided that the right 
of a citizen of the United States to vote should not be 
denied on account of race, color, or previous condition of 
servitude. In March, 1870, it went into force. The 
three Southern states, Virginia, Texas, and Mississippi, 
which had not yet been reconstructed, were admitted to 
the Union only on the condition of accepting this amend¬ 
ment. The Union was at last (1869) complete after the 
long years of disunion. 

679. The French Driven from Mexico.—Before leaving 
Johnson’s administration we must note two important 
matters in our relations with other nations. Napoleon III, 
the French Emperor, had taken advantage of the American 
war to defy the Monroe Doctrine and set up French power 
in America. He sent troops to Mexico, overthrew the 
government, and set up Maximilian, an Austrian prince, 
as emperor. When the war was over, the Union govern¬ 
ment informed the French that the sooner they left the 
better. Troops were sent to the Rio Grande and Grant 
and Sheridan would gladly have marched in and driven 
out the intruders. The French were wise and withdrew, 
but Maximilian stayed and was seized and shot by the 
Mexicans. This put an end to French occupation and 
warded off the danger of war with France. 

680. The Purchase of Alaska.—In 1867 Alaska was 
purchased from Russia for $7,200,000. At first Alaska’s 
only value seemed to be the seals upon its shores, and many 
men could not imagine why Secretary Seward wished to 
make the treaty, or the Senate to ratify it. We now see 
that the country is a valuable one; the recent gold discov¬ 
eries have alone far more than justified the purchase. 

681. Grant’s Diplomatic Record.—During Grant’s ad¬ 
ministration there were several diplomatic events of im- 


1 If they chose to lose part ol their representatives in Congress by not 
letting the negroes vote they might do so. 




RECONSTRUCTION 


399 


portance. In 1871 the Treaty of Washington settled three 
disputes with Great Britain. (1) The chief of these was a 
settlement of the Alabama Claims. During the war, it will 
be recalled, a number of cruisers, the most famous being the 
Alabama, were built, or refitted and supplied with coal in 
British ports, while that government made no proper efforts 
to stop this violation of British neutrality. The cruisers 
preyed upon and destroyed millions of dollars’ worth of 
American property on the seas. By the terms of the Treaty 
of Washington five judges were chosen, who met at Geneva, 
and after receiving the evidence, awarded the United States 
$15,500,000 in gold to repay damages. (2) The same 
treaty referred a dispute over the fisheries on our north¬ 
eastern shore to a commission which met at Halifax. In 
this case the judges awarded Great Britain $5,500,000. 
(3) A third dispute, which concerned the Oregon boundary, 
was left to the Emperor of Germany as arbitrator. He 
decided in favor of our claim, giving us the San Juan group 
of islands between Vancouver and the mainland- 

682. Grant Reelected. —By 1872 there was a strong 
feeling among many Republicans that Congress was going 
too far in its severe treatment of the South. These men 
formed the Liberal Republican Party and nominated for 
President, Horace Greeley, an old-time antislavery man, 
and the editor of the most influential Republican newspaper 
in the land. The Democrats accepted the nominee as their 
own. But Grant was reelected, carrying all but six states, 
and he continued in office till March 4, 1877. 

683. Evil Days in Grant’s Second Term. —Grant s second 
administration was chiefly remarkable for: (1) the great 
panic of 1873, during which the business of the country 
was thrown into much confusion and there was great suf¬ 
fering among the poor; (2) continuance of the difficulties 
in the South, where in some of the states negro or “ carpet¬ 
bag ” governments were supported by the national govern¬ 
ment, and the white people were indignant, restless, and 


400 


CIVIL WAR AND RECONSTRUCTION 


bitter; and (3) the fact that several cases of corruption 
among the officials of the government were discovered. 

It was evident that men must try to forget the old quar¬ 
rel and work for more honest government and higher ideals. 
Grant was not dishonest; some one has justly said that if he 
had tried to tell a lie he would not have known how to do 
it. But during the war and in the days of anxiety and ill 
feeling that followed, a few men who talked loudly of patri¬ 
otism had got into office and tried to fill their own pockets 
instead of serving the public. 


Suggested Readings 

Histories: (Lincoln) Williams, Some Successful Americans. Wil¬ 
son, Division and Reunion. McCall, Thaddeus Stevens. Storey, 
Charles Sumner. Andrews, Last Quarter of a Century, I. Wilson, 
Ulysses S. Grant. (For the Teacher) Dunning, Reconstruction. 

Sources: Hart, American History Told by Contemporaries, IV t 
Hart, Source Book, 127-134. 


VIII 


RECENT HISTORY AND THE RISE OF GREAT 
INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 

CHAPTER XLVIII 

THE RECONSTRUCTED NATION.—ITS NEW PROBLEMS 

684. The Tilden and Hayes Election. —The candidates 
for the presidency in 1876 were Rutherford B. Hayes, of 
Ohio, and Samuel J. Tilden, of New York. Hayes was a 
Republican and a quiet man of ability and simple honesty. 
Tilden, a lawyer of renown, had made himself favorably 



Map of the Election of 1876 


known by the war he had made on the Tweed Ring, a wicked 
company of officeholders in his own state. When the 
vote was counted it was found that Tilden had one hundred 
and eighty-four votes. If the electoral votes of South 
Carolina, Louisiana, Florida, and a disputed vote in Oregon 

401 
























402 INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 

were cast for Hayes, the latter would have one hundred and 
eighty-five—a majority of one. From each of the three 
Southern states where the “ carpetbag” government had 
created bitter partisan hate, there were two sets of electors, 
both asserting they were chosen properly and each declaring 
the other dishonest. The country was excited, but not 
really alarmed, for it was believed there was enough good 
sense in the land to settle the trouble. 

685. A Commission Favors Hayes.—Congress saw that 
an unusual step was necessary. A commission to decide 
the matter was therefore appointed, made up of five Sena¬ 
tors, five Representatives, and five justices of the Supreme 
Court. The commission decided in favor of Hayes, each 
member voting as his party’s interest dictated. Tilden, with 
wise and admirable patriotism, quietly accepted his defeat. 
Even if, as many men still think, injustice was done, such 
a peaceful settlement of a dispute was a great victory for 
free government. 

686. New Issues.—With the coming of Hayes to the 
presidential chair the country entered on a new stage of 
its life. There were, of course, no violent breaks with the 
past; men who were then living did not feel that they had 
passed from one era to another—such times of sudden change 
do not come in human history. But as we look back now 
over the events of the time, we see that the old issues were 
rapidly passing away; the political questions that grew out 
of the Civil War were nearly gone. The land was about 
to engage in new enterprises, and, in the course of a genera¬ 
tion, to startle the world by the vast growth of business, 
and by the use of new inventions and discoveries, so im¬ 
portant in their effect upon our daily life that they 
nearly equal in significance the invention of the steam 
engine. 

687. What a Century Had Wrought.—In the centennial 
year, 1876, a great exposition was held in Philadelphia, 
where the Declaration of Independence had been passed 


THE RECONSTRUCTED NATION 


403 


one hundred years before. 1 The United States of the 
Revolution contained about 2,500,000 people; one hundred 
years later there were over 50,000,000, and the republic, 
no longer a row of ill-connected states along the Atlantic 
seaboard, was made up of states and organized territories 
stretching across the continent. In 1776 the country was 
engaged in a war for the maintenance of what it believed 
to be its rights. Whether it would succeed in winning inde¬ 
pendence no one could tell; whether, if once independent, it 
could carry out its principles of freedom was questioned. 
Now at the end of its first century it could point to success¬ 
ful popular government; it had passed through the greatest 
civil war in history; slavery, though at enormous sacrifice 
of life and treasure, had been put away. The land was 
united, prosperous, hopeful, and determined. 

688. The Exposition. —The exposition brought people 
together from all over the land and appears to have had a 
marked effect in encouraging travel. For the visitor at 
Philadelphia “the world was brought together in a small 
compass.” “For the first time,” says one writer, “ thousands 
saw Chinese carpenters at work in truly antipodal manner, 
drank Paraguayan mate or tea, marveled at the many uses 
of gutta-percha, examined the wooden clocks from the 
Black Forest, were amused by the figures clad in peasant 
costumes from Sweden and from China, discussed a new 
floor covering known as 1 linoleum/ and wondered at the 
cunning workmanship and artistic invention of the almost 
unknown Japanese.” 2 

689. The Progress of Invention. —Before long a system 
of lighting by electricity was discovered. The arc lamp was 
invented, giving a strong and brilliant light for the streets, 

1 The later expositions at Chicago, 1893, at St. Louis, 1904, were much 
larger, much more beautiful than the one at Philadelphia. But the 
Centennial Exposition had great effect and enabled the people for the 
%st time to see themselves and look out upon the world. 

2 Sparks, “National Development,” p. 10. 



404 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


parks, and large buildings. Edison, after patient toil and 
ingenious effort, invented the incandescent lamp—the hollow 
airless bulb in which there is a fine filament made from fibre 
that glows without being consumed. 1 

The telephone and the phonograph came into use— 
the former now so common and indispensable that we can 
scarcely realize that such a short time ago we relied solely 
on the mails or the leisurely messenger lad, or sent our own 
boys from their play with urgent notes to our neighbors or 
the doctor. Electric railways w’ere built in many cities. 
It was apparent that at last we had discovered a means of 
rapid transportation that would displace all others. It was 
peculiarly fitting that here in America these marvelous 
inventions should be made; for here Franklin, the first 
American scientist to gain the world’s attention, drew the 
lightning from the cloud and proved that the flashes in 
the sky were but terrific electrical discharges. 

It is hard to realize, too, that before the time of the 
Centennial Exposition few Americans had seen a bicycle, 
except in the form of the 
old - fashioned velocipede. 

At the exposition there 
was shown a bicycle made 
abroad, a curious affair with 
a huge front wdieel five feet 
or so in diameter and a 
small hind wheel about one 
fifth that size. The rider 
sat aloft, astride the big 

w T heel and almost directly above its axle, at the imminent 
peril of taking a “ header ” over the handle bars. Some 
eight years later the “ safety ” bicycle, now so common, 
was invented. 



An Old Velocipede and a High- 
wheel Bicycle 


1 The arc light is made by sending a current of electricity through 
two carbon sticks held a short distance from each other. The ends of 
the carbon sticks are heated to incandescence. 












THE RECONSTRUCTED NATION 


405 


690. Hayes’ Great Aim.—Returning to our political 
history, we must bear in mind that Hayes was not known 
very well when he was made President, and men did not 
know what to expect from him. He was of a modest and 
gentle disposition, but his clear head and sound conscience 
enabled him to see the right and to do it quietly. One thing 
he had close at heart, was to put an end as best he could 
to the continuing ill feeling between North and South. As 
long as Federal troops remained at the South, watching 
over elections and interfering, or ready to interfere, with 
local matters, the Southern people must feel that they 
were, in a measure, held in bondage and were not given the 
right to full self-government. The very presence of the 
troops was an irritation. Soon after his inauguration the 
President ordered the withdrawal of the army from the public 
buildings of these states. 

691. The End of Reconstruction.—This was the end of 

Reconstruction. There was still much to be done to bring 
North and South together in a feeling of friendship and 
trust. The South still faced the grave difficulties that 
came from the change in her whole labor system; she had 
to deal with four million black freedmen; her tasks required 
wisdom and courage. But she could now rely upon herself 
and attack her new problems unhampered by the presence 
of the Northern army. 

692. The “ Greenback ” Trouble.—One of the relics of the 
war was the “ greenback/’ the paper money that had been 
issued to defray the expenses of the Government. This 
money had fallen in value, because people feared that the 
Government would never be able to redeem the paper in 
gold and silver, the ordinary money of the world. If one 
is sure that he can send his paper money to the bank or the 
treasury and get specie (gold and silver) for it, he is content to 
use it and not send it. But if he knows he cannot get specie 
for it, and if he distrusts the Government’s power ever to pay 
in specie, he does not prize his piece of paper very highly. At 


406 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


one time in 1864, a paper dollar would buy only two fifths 
as much as a gold dollar would buy. 1 In the election of 
1876 there had been a Greenback Party, advocating the 
use of unredeemable paper permanently as the money of 
the country. They had fortunately been defeated. 

693. Specie Payment.—The war debt was being reduced, 
and there was no real cause for anxiety about the country’s 
finances. In Grant’s second term Congress had declared 
that on January 1, 1879, the country would pay every man 
that so desired gold or silver for his paper money. Some 
people doubted for a time the ability of the Government 
to bring this about; but when the day came, though the 
Government was ready to pay, no paper was presented for 
redemption. If people knew they could get gold they did 
not want it. And thus the vast sums of paper money were 
made good; the country stood by its promises honestly. 

694. The Railway Strike of 1877; The Labor Problem.—Of 
all the events of Hayes’ time, the one we remember best, 
perhaps, is the great railway strike of 1877, for this was the 
first great strike in our history, the dramatic beginning of a 
series of struggles between laborers and their employers. The 
trouble was caused by cutting down the wages of workmen on 
the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad; but it was not confined to 
that road. It spread through fourteen states. The situation 
in Pittsburg was especially bad. In that city alone, prop¬ 
erty to the value of $10,000,000 was destroyed. Peace 
was finally restored and the railroads went on with their 
business quietly. 

But the terrible experiences of those days showed what 
serious trials were in store, if employers and workingmen could 
not learn to respect each other’s needs and to work in har¬ 
mony. This was the first time in our history that the great 
body of men in this country faced with anxiety the perplex- 

1 We now have paper that buys just as much as gold does. But its 
value is maintained by the fact that it can be exchanged for gold if any¬ 
body really demands it. 





THE RECONSTRUCTED NATION 407 

ities of the labor problem. How could the rights of both 
sides be secured? Would workmen treat capital and prop¬ 
erty with consideration? Would capitalists give the work¬ 
men a chance to improve their condition and to move 
upward to better living? Men wondered and doubted. 
From that day to this labor has been organizing, and to 


The Railway Strike of 1877 

Rioters stopping a train on the Erie R.R. From a contemporary illus¬ 
tration in Leslie's Weekly. 

meet its growing power, capital, too, has organized, and the 
problem of the relations of capital and labor has become 
ever more complex. 

695. The Tariff as a Campaign Issue.—In 1880 the Re¬ 
publicans nominated James A. Garfield, of Ohio, for the 
presidency; and the Democrats nominated Winfield S. 
Hancock, the hero—one of the heroes—of Gettysburg. 
Garfield was elected. The two parties now differed plainly 
and clearly on the tariff. The Republicans stood for a 
high duty for the protection of American manufactures; 
the Democrats demanded a tariff for revenue, not for pro- 

















408 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


tection—just high enough to pay the expenses of govern¬ 
ment. Garfield became President March 4, 1881. 

696. Garfield and Patronage.—He faced trouble at the 
very beginning He appointed, as Secretary of State, James 
G. Blaine, who was an able man and one who for some years 
had had great popularity in his party. The appointment 
of Blaine, however, irritated Roscoe Conkling, Senator from 
New York. The two men disliked each other heartily. It 
had long been customary for the President to consult the 
Senators from a particular state before making any im¬ 
portant appointments to office in the state; the appoint¬ 
ments had, in fact, been practically made by the Senators. 
When Garfield refused to be dictated to by Mr. Conkling, 
the latter, together with his colleague, Senator Platt, re¬ 
signed from the Senate, and appealed for vindication to 
the Legislature, which, however, refused to reelect them. 

697. Civil Service Problems.—This quarrel may appear 
a trivial matter; but there, was great excitement about it 
at the time. One might actually have thought the Republic 
was in danger. In truth, it brought home to thinking 
citizens the reality of a serious fact—the fact that quarrels 
arose not over vital principles deeply affecting the life of the 
Republic, but over offices and salaries. People therefore 
thought more carefully than before as to whether such con¬ 
tests were worth while, and whether our political life would 
not be cleaner and sounder if the offices were not scattered 
about so freely at the beginning of every President’s term 
as they had been from the days of Jackson. 1 2 

1 The new President was a man of ability and vigor. Like so many 
men that had arisen to high office in America, he had begun life in pov¬ 
erty and had overcome difficulties by energy and courage. 

2 There is a good story of Lincoln who, one day during the most 
anxious days of the Civil War when the fate of the land hung in the 
balance, was seen by one of his friends to be much preoccupied and ap¬ 
parently cast down. The friend said: “I hope, Mr. President, you 
have not received bad news from the front.” “Oh,no,” said Lincoln. 
“It's the postmastership at Brownsville.” 




THE RECONSTRUCTED NATION 409 

698. Garfield Assassinated. —This petty quarreling now 
took a tragic turn. On the morning of July 2d, 1881, 
as the President was entering the railway station at 
Washington, he was shot, lhe assassin was a fanatic 
who had come to Washington as an office-seeker and ap¬ 
peared to have been much wrought up, perhaps temporarily 
deranged, by his failure to get office. Garfield lingered, 
battling bravely and hopefully for life, till September 19th. 
His death was a great shock to the people. Twice within 
twenty years the chief magistrate of the nation had been 
killed, and in this latter instance the crime could not be 
attributed to the excitement and enmity begotten by civil 
war. Even in free, prosperous America, rulers, the faithful 
servants of the people, "were in danger. 

699. Arthur Becomes President. — The Vice President, 
Chester A. Arthur, became President. He had not held 
high official position before assuming the vice presidency, 
and little was known of his fitness for the new duties that 
came so unexpectedly It was soon apparent, however, 
that he was a man of character and strength. His admin¬ 
istration was dignified and able. 

700. The Civil Service Acts. — The tragedy of President 
Garfield’s death, coming as the awful climax of petty dis¬ 
putes over appointments to office, called attention sharply to 
the follies of the “ Spoils System.’ President Arthur strongly 
recommended change, and in 1883 a civil service act was 
passed. It empowered the President to provide for com¬ 
petitive examinations, as a means of selecting persons for 
clerical positions in the Government. Provision was also 
made for a civil service commission, charged with the duty 
of supervising the new system. From that day to this the 
plan has been gradually developed, until now a very large 
proportion of the civil officers of the Government are ap¬ 
pointed after test examinations, and hold their positions 
during good behavior. 

701. Cleveland Elected President.— For the election of 


410 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


1884 the Democrats nominated for the presidency Grover 
Cleveland, of New York; the Republicans, James G. Blaine, 
of Maine. The campaign was one of great interest. Though 
Blaine was the idol of a large portion of his party, there 
were some to whom he did not appeal. Some Republicans 
refused to support him, and were disdainfully called Mug¬ 
wumps,” a name that came into common use to designate a 
non-partisan or an independent voter. They held the balance 
of power in New York, and, as a result, Cleveland carried 
the state and was elected. Thus, after having failed since 
the election of Buchanan to win the presidential election, 
the Democrats were once again successful. 

702. Labor Problems—During Cleveland’s administra¬ 
tion there were new labor troubles of a serious character. 
Everywhere labor unions were forming and the number of 
members was rapidly increasing. The Knights of Labor, 
which had been established some years before, became now 
of national importance. By 1886 it was said to have five 
hundred thousand members, and erelong, many thousands 
more. The most important strike was one against the Gould 
system of railroads in Texas, Missouri, Kansas, and Illinois. 
At one time six thousand miles of road could not be used. 
There was striking and rioting in other portions of the country. 

703. Anarchy and Free Speech.— In Chicago a small 
group of men, taking advantage of such liberty of speech 
and thought as would have been allowed them nowhere else 
in the world, had for some time been advocating lawlessness 
and violence. In May, 1886, a mass meeting was held in 
Haymarket Sauare, where speeches were made by violent 
anarchists. When the police endeavored to disperse the 
crowd some one threw a bomb, shots were fired, and when 
the smoke cleared away it was found that over sixty of 
the police were killed or wounded. Some of the anarchists 
were arrested, brought before the courts, given every oppor¬ 
tunity to prove their innocence, but were found guilty and 
executed. Here was a new problem for free government— 


PARTY DIFFERENCES.—SOCIAL UNREST 411 

how to allow free speech and at the same time prevent vio¬ 
lence and wicked incitement to murder. 

704. Presidential Succession.—Among other important 
laws passed by Congress during these years was one making 
provision for succession to the presidency in case of the 
death or disability of both the President and Vice President. 
In such an emergency the Secretary of State would succeed, 
and, if the necessity should arise, other members of the 
Cabinet were authorized to assume the presidential duties. 1 

705. The Tariff.—The question of the tariff was now 
one of great interest, and party lines were more sharply 
drawn on this question. The Democrats, under Cleveland’s 
leadership, opposed the protective tariff as an unwise and 
burdensome tax, bearing most heavily on the poor; the Re¬ 
publicans as strongly defended protection, claiming that 
without it American factories could not be kept up or high 
wages be paid to workmen. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: Andrews, Last Quarter of a Century. Wilson, Division 
and Reunion. Elson, Side Lights on American History , II. 

Sources: Hart, American History Told by Contemporaries , IV. 
Hart, Source Booh. 


CHAPTER XLIX 

PARTY DIFFERENCES—SOCIAL UNREST 

706. Harrison Elected.—In 1888 the candidates for the 
presidency were Grover Cleveland and Benjamin Harrison. 
The latter, the Republican candidate, was elected. His 
administration was not eventful. A measure known as the 
McKinley Bill, greatly increasing the tariff duties, was 

1 The order of succession of Cabinet officers to the presidency was 
the order of their establishment, as follows: (1) The Secretary of State; 
(2) The Secretary of the Treasury; (3) The Secretary of War; (4) The 
Attorney General; (5) The Postmaster General; (6) The Secretary of 
the Navy; (7) The Secretary of the Interior. 



412 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


passed, and the question of a high protective tariff became 
more clearly than ever, if possible, the question of dispute 
between parties. 

707. The Coinage of Silver.—Congress passed an act 
known as the Sherman Act, providing for Government 
purchase of silver in large quantities each month. It was 
to be paid for by notes issued for the purpose by the Secretary 
of the Treasury and called silver certificates. The Govern¬ 
ment thus became the owner of an ever-increasing mass of 
uncoined silver and became debtor for a growing sum 
represented by the notes issued. It was evident, therefore, 
that the time might come when the Government could pay 
only in silver, and, as silver had been given up as the standard 
of value by most civilized countries, this condition was 
thought by many to involve serious danger to our business 
and general prosperity. 

708. Cleveland Elected, 1892.— In the election of 1892 
the contest was between the same candidates as four years 
earlier. The principles dividing the parties were much the 
same as before. The Republicans praised a tariff for pro¬ 
tection; the Democrats denounced Republican protection as 
“ a fraud, a robbery of the great majority of the American 
people for the benefit of the few.” Both parties favored the 
use of both gold and silver as standard money. The People’s 
party, or the Populists, demanded the free coinage of silver 
at the rate of sixteen to one, 1 the ownership of railroads 
and telegraphs by the Government, and other measures 
thought to be helpful to the masses of the people. In this 
election Cleveland was chosen, bringing success for the 
second time to his party. 


1 This meant that if a person could take ten ounces of gold to the 
mint and have it coined into dollars, one could likewise take 160 ounces 
">f silver and have it coined into the same number of dollars as the first 
person received for his gold bullion. In other words, gold and silver 
bullion were to be freely coined by the Government, and the silver bul¬ 
lion was to be counted as worth one sixteenth of a like amount of gold. 



PARTY DIFFERENCES.—SOCIAL UNREST 413 


709. The Hawaiian Islands. —In the latter part of 
President Harrison’s administration there was a revolution 
in the Hawaiian Islands. The native queen was deposed 
and the government passed into the hands of men who were 
of American or English parentage. The new rulers estab¬ 
lished a government and asked for annexation to the United 
States. A treaty for this purpose was speedily made and 
submitted to the Senate for approval. This treaty had 
not been finally ratified when Cleveland came to the pres¬ 
idency (March 4, 1893) and he withdrew the treaty from 
the Senate. It did not appear to him that the Americans 
had acted with fairness and impartiality at the time of the 
revolution. 

710. Hawaiian Islands Are Annexed, 1898. —Five years 
later when the national attention was fixed on other matters, 
Hawaii was quietly annexed. The annexation of California 
forty years before had determined that America should be a 
Pacific as well as an Atlantic power, and the possession of 
Hawaii was another step toward making the United States 
an influential power in the Orient—in China and Japan. 

711. The Panic of 1893. —Hardly was Cleveland’s 
second administration well under way when there began 
one of the most disastrous panics in our history. It is 
difficult to explain in a word the causes and conditions that 
led to it. Men had been rushing ahead wildly, spending 
money freely, beginning new enterprises, getting into debt, 
expecting that they would rapidly turn hopes into money or 
shares in some big plan into actual cash in the bank. But 
soon a few began to hold back and fear for consequences; 
money became “ tight ” or difficult to obtain; then the houses 
of cards toppled, and men whose whole fortune was invested 
in hopes and who had risked their all in some big schemes 
that depended for success on others lending them money, 
found themselves poor, if not hopeless. 

712. Suffering Ensues. —The silver question added to 
the trouble. Business men feared that the country would 


414 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


be obliged to redeem all its obligations in silver and that, 
many thought, meant disaster. The Sherman Act as to 
the coinage of silver was repealed. But that gave little, 
if any, visible relief. The Federal Government actually had 
to borrow money, and there was general gloom and much 
suffering. Before winter set in (1893), it was estimated 
that eighty thousand people in New York, one hundred 
and twenty thousand people in Chicago, and sixty thousand 
people in Philadelphia were out of work and threatened by 
cold and starvation. 

713. The Great Strike of 1894. —During the next year 
matters were made worse by strikes, especially among rail¬ 
way men. The strikers were, moreover, joined by reckless 
lawbreakers, who are always the real enemies of both 
employers and workmen. In Chicago, mobs gathered in 
the railway yards, burned hundreds of cars, interfered with 
the movements of trains, and imperiled life and property. 
President Cleveland ordered troops to the city and the 
rioters w^ere held in check. 

714. The Labor Problem. —With the coming of peace— 
for peace finally came—there was a chance for men calmly 
to realize the danger of such uprisings. It was plain that 
there was danger in the power which a few labor leaders 
held in their hands, for without the ordinary restraints of 
rulers they could control the action of many thousands 
of men; it was just as plain that there was grievous wrong 
on the other side, wrong that must be righted if there were 
to be social rest. Many men probably realized better than 
ever before the need of being just. They saw how great 
are the tasks of maintaining law and order in a free country. 
They realized that the root of successful self-government 
is self-control. 

715. The Campaign of 1896: the Silver Question. —As 

the campaign of 1896 approached, it was evident that the 
Democratic Party was divided against itself. Mr. Cleveland 
and those that were with him did not believe in the silver 


PARTY DIFFERENCES.—SOCIAL UNREST 


415 


policy that was now advocated by many men of his party. 1 
The demand for the free coinage of silver was taken up 
by the Democratic convention, which nominated William 
Jennings Bryan, of Nebraska, for the Presidency. Some of 



the party, calling themselves Gold Democrats, refused to 
follow Mr. Bryan’s leadership and nominated candidates of 
their own; but the great masses of the party entered en¬ 
thusiastically into the campaign and were ably led by Mr. 


1 The gold men did not believe that the Government should freely 
coin silver at the rate of 16 to 1. At that time the silver in a silver 
dollar was worth only about fifty cents; if the amount coined was lim¬ 
ited, and if the Government stood ready to pay all debts in gold, then the 
silver dollars would be received at their face value. But if the silver 
policy were adopted and there was unlimited coinage of silver, it could 
not be expected that silver would pass for more than it was actually 
worth. We would be paying our debts in fifty-cent dollars, said the 
gold men, and that is, they declared, dishonest. The silver men claimed, 
on the other hand, that the offer of the Government to coin freely would 
at once raise the price of silver, and make a silver dollar worth one 
hundred cents in the markets of the world. 






























416 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 



Bryan, a man of ideals and of great sincerity, who was 
gifted with unusual powers of persuasive speech. 

716. A Campaign of Education.—The Republicans nomi¬ 
nated William McKinley and 
declared in favor of gold and 
the tariff. The contest, hotly 
waged during the summer of 
1896, was one of the most im¬ 
portant and interesting in our 
history. The people of the 
whole nation talked of politics, 
coinage, and money; and this 
alone made the campaign im¬ 
portant, because one of the 
great benefits of a free govern¬ 
ment is that it tempts the com¬ 
mon man to think and to speak 
and to act on matters of interest 
to all. McKinley was elected. 1 




Suggested Readings 

Histories: Wilson, Division and Reunion. Andrews, Last Quarter 
of a Century. Coman, Industrial History. 


CHAPTER L 
THE WAR WITH SPAIN 

717. The Cuban Rebellion.—President McKinley’s ad¬ 
ministration was scarcely begun (1897) when it was plain 
that we might have war. For some years past, conditions 
in Cuba had been causing anxiety. The native Cubans, 
trying to throw off the rule of Spain, were in rebellion and 

1 The new President was a man of great personal charm with an un¬ 
usual faculty for winning men. His long career in Congress well fitted 
him for the practical duties of his new office. 






THE WAR WITH SPAIN 


41 ? 


were fighting with a hardihood and patience which were 
admirable. Our people were naturally in sympathy with 
the rebels, and even those who did not allow their sym¬ 
pathies to move them could not help remembering that 
many times in the last fifty years the Cuban question had 
caused trouble and perplexity. They began to think that 
we should not be relieved as' long as Spain held the 
island. 

718. Americans Sympathize with the Cubans.—The meth¬ 
ods used by Spain to put down the Cuban rebellion ap¬ 
peared to be cruel, and even if reports about them were 
exaggerated, the stories stirred many Americans to resent¬ 
ment. So decided were the Cubans not to yield, that they 
persevered in penury and want while large parts of the 
island were laid waste, and when complete ruin stared them 
in the face. The insurgents themselves, in fact, had done 
much to desolate the land and to make it valueless to Spain. 
We were obliged to police our shores to prevent “ filibus¬ 
tered ” carrying aid to the rebels and increasing the evils. 
The situation was a delicate one and it was evident before 
the beginning of 1898 that any unfortunate incident might 
hurry us into a war with Spain. 

719. The Maine Blown up; War Declared.—On February 
15, 1898, such an incident occurred. The United States 
battleship Maine, riding peacefully at anchor in the harbor 
of Havana, was blown up. She sank within a few minutes, 
carrying with her two hundred and fifty officers and men. 
Great excitement prevailed in this country. Many supposed 
the destruction of the battleship was the deliberate work of 
Spanish officials, and they believed the insult and the injury 
were unbea able. A careful inquiry by an American board 
seemed to demonstrate that the ship was not destroyed by 
an explosion of her own magazines; and though it was not 
thought that the Spanish Government could be guilty of an 
act at once foolish and cruel, it was seemingly a Spanish 
mine, possibly fired by Spanish hands, that had brought 


418 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


disaster. 1 Resolutions were passed by Congress in favor 
of Cuban independence (April 19). This amounted to a 
declaration of war. At once thousands of men joined the 
army, raising the cry “Remember the Maine.” 

720. The Battle of Manila, May 1, 1898.—The first battle 
occurred in the far-off Philippine Islands. Admiral George 
Dewey with a small fleet sailed into the harbor of Manila and 
met the Spanish ships in the harbor. Each commander had 
nearly the same number of ships—the American six, the 
Spanish five; but the Americans had much the advantage 
in strength. The result of the conflict was a signal victory 
for Dewey and his keen-eyed gunners. 2 Dewey became the 
hero of the hour. 

721. A Spanish Fleet Blockaded in a Cuban Harbor.— 

In the meantime steps were taken to blockade the harbor 
of Havana and preparations were made to meet the enemy’s 
ships that were expected from Spain. Admiral Cervera 
with a formidable fleet sailed from the Cape Verde Islands 
at the end of April. There was some fear in the cities of 
the coast that he would come to bombard them; but the 
officers of the American navy were confident that he would 
seek a port in the Spanish West Indies, and so it proved. 
The Spanish fleet, after a slow voyage, anchored in the 
harbor of Santiago, on the south shore of Cuba. Here they 
were speedily blockaded by an American squadron in com¬ 
mand of Admiral Sampson. 

722. Hobson’s Brave Attempt to Seal the Harbor.—The 

harbor of Santiago was protected by forts, and our Govern¬ 
ment decided to send troops to the spot, land them near 
the town, and take the place, if possible, while the ships 

X A Spanish commission reported that, in its judgment,the explosion 
was due to some internal cause. 

2 All the American ships were such that the shot of the enemy, had 
it been well directed, might have done great damage; but the Spaniards 
could not shoot straight. “There was courage in abundance but no 
training.” 



THE WAR WITH SPAIN 


419 


under Sampson, posted at the entrance of the harbor, 
should prevent the escape of the Spanish ships. To keep 
the Spanish fleet in the harbor a collier loaded with coal 
was to be sunk in the narrow channel at the entrance. 
Lieutenant Hobson was given command of the Merrimac 
and charged with the perilous duty of running her under 
the guns of the forts and sinking her in the channel. She 
sank too far up the channel to be of service in blocking it, 
but the fleet held the entrance, watching it night and day. 

723. The American Army in Cuba.—General Shatter, 
with a force of some sixteen thousand men, landed near 
Santiago in June, attack¬ 
ed the defenses of the 
town and met with some 
success at San Juan Hill 
and El Caney. Here it 
was that Colonel Roose¬ 
velt and a troop of cow¬ 
boys, known as the 
“ Rough Riders,” dis¬ 
tinguished themselves. The brave Spaniards fought well 
and stubbornly. The American army, in many ways ill 
prepared for service in a tropical climate, showed rare 
heroism. For days they were ill fed, their clothing was 
heavy and burdensome, they had to fight through the thick 
jungle and to face an enemy firing with smokeless powder 
from a protected place; but they endured with patience and 
fought with zeal. 

724. The Spanish Fleet Destroyed, July 3, 1898.—On the 

morning of July 3d the Spanish fleet slipped out of the 
harbor and sought to escape. The American ships, which 
under Sampson's wise care had been watching the 
channel with the utmost caution for weeks, were imme¬ 
diately in hot pursuit, led by Admiral Schley who was pres¬ 
ent and next in command. The ill-fated Spanish ships were 
doomed; one by one they were overtaken and destroyed. 



Field cf the Campaigns in Cuba 








420 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


725. The End of the War.—The destruction of Cervera's 
fleet practically ended the war. The island of Porto Rico 

was invaded and 
taken. An army was 
sent to the Philip¬ 
pines to complete 
Dewey's victory, 
and in August the 
town of Manila was 
taken by assault. 
Soon after this a 
treaty was signed at 
Paris whereby Spain 
acknowledged the freedom of Cuba. The Philippines, 
Guam, and Porto Rico were turned over to the United 
States, who paid to Spain $20,000,0002 

The American people have been inclined to think that 
the Spanish-American War was at no time serious, but 
the truth is that in our unprepared state destruction all 
unsuspected yawned before us. Germany longed to form 
a European alliance against us, and for the time even our 
old friend France was angry with us for warring with Spain. 
In Manila Bay a German fleet acted in a very threatening 
way, but a British fleet showed that it would range its guns 
and ships with ours, and the German admiral dared not 
strike. The British Government was approached by Ger¬ 
many on the subject of intervention between Spain and the 
United States, but Great Britain sympathized with us and 
would not listen. Without the assurance that the British 
fleet would not aid us, Germany feared to attack. Had 
Germany forced us into war, in our weak state it would 
almost surely have brought defeat, for Germany was very 
strong, as the world was to learn later. 

726. The End of the Great Spanish Empire in the New 
World.—Thus ended the Spanish Empire in the New World 



1 During the war the Hawaiian Islands were annexed. See p. 413. 
















THE WAR WITH SPAIN 


421 


and the far Orient. From the day when Columbus sailed 
westward on the Sea of Darkness to discover a new way 
to the Indies, Spain had had a great career. Now all was 
gone. And yet not all: for though she could no longer 
claim title to land in the New World, she left behind in 
the states of Central and South America and in the islands 
of the Indies the Spanish language and Spanish tra¬ 
dition. She had planted civilization and religion in a new 
continent. 

727. America’s New Tasks.—New tasks now came to 
America. (1) Our Government was called upon to take 
charge of millions of people who did not, know our life or 
our political methods; many of them were not able to know. 
We had a great colonial task. (2) Moreover, our position in 
the Far East made it necessary for us to occupy ourselves, 
as never before, with difficult questions of “ world politics,” 
that is to say, questions concerning the desires, the policies, 
and acts of other nations. (3) We had to maintain a larger 
army and navy. (4) We must at the same time, if we be 
true to our past, preserve principles of liberty and treat the 
people of the colonies with justice. Other results of the 
war were that the North and South were reunited by fight¬ 
ing side by side; our commerce was expanded; and in the 
estimation of European people, our importance in the world 
was greatly increased. 

728. Summary of Territorial Expansion.—This last ex¬ 
pansion of the territory of the United States completes the 
story of its marvelous growth to our time. Starting with 
thirteen states stretched along the Atlantic coast, and a 
territorial possession extending west of these states to the 
Mississippi River, and south to the thirty-first parallel, 
the country had expanded by leaps and bounds. In 1803 
the warlike ambitions of the great Napoleon had made 
possible the purchase of Louisiana—a million square miles 
at one master stroke. Sixteen years later Spain ceded 
Florida, thus rounding out our possessions east of the 


422 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


Mississippi. In 1845 and 1846 the annexation of Texas, the 
cessions by Mexico, and the settlement of the dispute 
with Great Britain concerning the Oregon country spread 
our domain far away over the crest of the Rockies to the 
shores of the Pacific. In 1853 the Gadsden Purchase ex¬ 
tended our bounds on the Southwest. Fourteen years later, 
Russia sold us Alaska, half a million square miles not con¬ 
tiguous to the solid mass of our former territory. In 1898, 
for the first time the spirit of expansion carried our flag to 
the islands of the sea, to Hawaii, and a year later to the 
Philippines, to Porto Rico, and to Guam. America had at 
last become a world power, sharing with other great nations 
the work of regulating the less civilized parts of the globe. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: Elson, Side Lights on American History. Wilson, Divi¬ 
sion and Reunion. Andrews, Last Quarter of a Century. Maclay, 
United States Navy. Brooks, War with Spain. Morris, War with 
Spain. 


CHAPTER LI 

INDUSTRIAL DEVELOPMENT: TRANSPORTATION—THE 
GREAT WEST AND THE NEW SOUTH 

729. Gold and Silver in the Rocky Mountains.—Let us now 

turn back to see the growth of the country from about the 
time of the Civil War and especially to notice the marvelous 
growth of the great West. The earliest settlers in the 
distracted territories of Kansas and Nebraska were hardly 
accustomed to their new homes before rumor ran from 
village to village throughout the land that gold had been 
found in the neighborhood of Pike’s Peak (1859) 2 There 
was a rush for the mountains. Wagon after wagon, w r ith 
“ Pike’s Peak or Bust ” blazoned on the covers, set out 

1 In January of that year six quills of gold were brought into Omaha 
from the mountains. There had been considerable movement into the 
region the previous year. 




Territorial Growth of the United States 




























































INDUSTRIAL DEVELOPMENT: TRANSPORTATION 423 


over the plain. Thousands went, but many returned; 
for while there was some success there was more disap¬ 
pointment. This, however, was the beginning of the great 
mining history of the Rocky Mountains. Silver was found 
about the same time in the western part of Utah, in a por¬ 
tion of that territory which later became Nevada. As years 
went by there came from Colorado, from Utah, from Ne¬ 
vada, from Idaho, from Montana, gold and silver, and lead 
and copper of immense value. 

730. The Steamboat and the Prairie Schooner. —We have 
seen how large portions of the Mississippi basin, especially 
the eastern portions, were settled with the help of the steam¬ 
boat. By means of big, flat-bottomed boats, too, a great 
traffic was carried up and down the main rivers and their 
tributaries. The country to the west of the Mississippi 
was entered by a somewhat different mode of transportation. 
The Missouri is the only river in that region which is navi¬ 
gable for any great distance, and that, as one may see by 
glancing at a map, in the country west of Missouri runs 
rather north and south than east and west. It was, there¬ 
fore, little used by the pioneers moving toward the Pacific. 
In the days of the first movement into the Far West, before 
the Civil War, the great prairies were crossed by regular 
trails; the pack horse or the prairie schooner, therefore, did 
the work that the flatboat, the canoe, or the steamboat had 
done in the country east of the Missouri. 

731. The Santa Fe Trail. —The first route across the 
prairies ran from western Missouri to Santa Fe, New Mexico. 
Pack trains carrying goods to exchange for Mexican products 
followed this route even before the annexation of the western 
country at the end of the Mexican War. It was a long, hard 
road, six hundred miles or so over the dry plains, but the road 
was patiently traveled by the frontier merchants with their 
horses, mules, and huge prairie wagons . 1 

1 The trail was used for carrying freight back and forth for fifty years 
before the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad was built. This 



424 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


732. The Oregon Trail.—Even before California was taken 
(1848), or before the great Northwest was secured as part of 
the United States (1846), a pass through the mountains had 
been discovered and a long trail led from Council Bluffs, Iowa, 
on to the Columbia region and into the heart of the Oregon 
country. This was the Oregon trail, and hundreds of set¬ 
tlers in well-arranged caravans passed over the plains and 
through the defiles of the mountains to find new homes in the 
beautiful land beyond—thousands of miles from the farms 
and cities of the East. * 1 

733., The Salt Lake Trail; the “Pony Express.”—In the 

days before the Civil War a trail also led out to Salt 
Lake City, where the 
Mormons had begun 
their settlements (1847). 

This was the Great Salt 
Lake trail. Before 1860 
a daily stage was running 
from the Missouri River 
to Salt Lake City, and 
there was a “ pony ex¬ 
press ” chiefly for the 
carrying of mail rapidly 
to and from California. 

The rapidity of the jour¬ 
ney across the plains, through the mountain passes and 
over the great desert plateaus of the farther West was 

railroad running from the cities of eastern Kansas and western Missouri 
into the great Southwest and following much the same line as the old 
trail, of course, carried the freight which in earlier years had gone by 
w agon. TV hen in 1880 the engines entered Santa Fe over the iron rails 
the day of the old trail was over; its deep ruts can still be traced in 
places, a reminder of days of danger and of romance. 

1 The journey with these long trains took five months. Small herds 
of cattle were often driven along. The ponderous oxen dragged the 
heavy wagons. Great herds of buffalo were encountered on the plains. 
The road through the mountains was unbelievably rough and hard. 



The Pony Express 




INDUSTRIAL DEVELOPMENT: TRANSPORTATION 425 


remarkable. It was a long relay race against time; nearly 
two thousand miles had to be covered in eight days; there was 
no loitering, no turning aside for danger; only a second or two 
was taken as the precious mail pouch was handed from one 
rider to another; on they went—one after the other—the 
mail going forward across the wilderness at the rate of two 
hundred and fifty miles a day. 1 By the time of the Civil War 
a stagecoach was running across the continent to Sacramento. 

734. The Pacific Railroad.—But from the time when 
California was annexed (1848), men dreamed of a Pacific 



Trails to the West and Routes of Pacific Railroads 

railroad; they saw that the two coasts of the continent 
must some day be bound together by iron bands. Old and 

1 The riders had each a division of from one hundred to one hundred 
and forty miles and fresh horses about every twenty-five miles. It 
seems almost incredible that in 1860 one trip from St. Joseph to Denver, 
six hundred and fifty miles, was made in two days and twenty-one 
hours. 



























426 INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 

young saw visions of the day when the steam engine would 
puff its way through the narrow defiles of the mountains and 
startle the buffalo and the Indian of the plains. W hen the 
Civil War came on, such symbols of union between the West 


Driving the Last Spike 
A scene near Ogden, Utah, May 10, 1869. 

and the East appeared more desirable than ever. Two com¬ 
panies were formed—the Central Pacific and the Union Pacific. 
The Government gave aid. The former company built from 
the West toward the East; the latter built westward across the 
plains of Nebraska and over the mountain passes of Wyom¬ 
ing. (See map on p. 425.) The two lines met a few miles west 
of Ogden, Utah, and the last spike was driven May 10, 1869. 1 
The nation thrilled with interest; the dreary, dangerous 

1 Read Bret Harte’s “What the Engine Said”: 

“What was it the Engines said, 

Pilots touching—head to head, 

Facing on the single track 
Half a world behind each back.” 






INDUSTRIAL DEVELOPMENT: TRANSPORTATION 427 


journey across the continent was a thing of the past; the 
caravan and the pony express were passing into history. 

735. The Newer Pacific Roads.—This line across the con¬ 
tinent passed over league after league of unpeopled territory. 
In a few years men with boundless belief in the West planned 
other roads. The Southern Pacific, a line from New Orleans 
to the Pacific Ocean, was finished in 1883. The Santa Fe road 
was built about the same time into the Southwest. Then a 
line was finished at the north—the Northern Pacific—a task 
that called for superb engineering skill. (See map, p. 425.) 

736. Homestead Act of 1862.—All of these new avenues to 
the unpeopled West were of great service in carrying out a 
land policy entered upon by the government in the second 
year of the war. In 1862 a Homestead Act was passed pro¬ 
viding that any head of a family might become the owner 
of 160 acres of public land by settling and dwelling upon it 
for five years. Union soldiers were allowed to deduct from 
the five years the term of their army service. This law 
helped people the West, and kept wages up in the East by 
drawing off the surplus population. 

737. The Importance of the Railroad.—The building of 
railroads was probably the most important event in the 

history of the 
West. Without 
the roads, the 
country would 
have slowly 
grown by the 
help of the old 
trails and the 
prairie schooner; 
but when the 
railroads were built, the peopling of the country, the turn¬ 
ing of the prairie land into farms, the occupation of the 
valleys of the mountain region, discovery of new mines, the 
building up of cities, went on with astonishing quickness. 



A Modern Steam Locomotive 

This is the heaviest freight locomotive in the world. 
Weight of engine and tender, 700,000 pounds. 








428 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


738. The Great Desert Disappears.—The fathers of the 
schoolboys of to-day can remember that their geographies 
which they studied as boys at school, had “ Great American 
Desert’’ running in large letters across a good part of the 
country beyond 
the Missouri 
River, over a 
region that is 
now filled with 
thousands of vil¬ 
lages and pros¬ 
perous farms. In 
the nooks and 
corners of the 
great mountain 
ranges where men thought there was nothing but bleakness, 
are now mining camps, comfortable towns, and prosperous 
cities. There boys and girls go to good schools, read good 
books, and do not stop to think that when their fathers were 
boys the whole surrounding region was as unoccupied and 
as unknown as was Massachusetts when Miles Standish, 
Priscilla, and John Alden were living in old Plymouth. 

739. New States.—In 1880, in all the region north of Utah 
and of the Union Pacific Railroad, there were only here and 
there a few settlements. By 1890 the population had grown 
so that North and South Dakota, Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, 
and Washington were admitted to the Union as states. The 
westward expansion, the peopling of the wide prairies and 
the mountain valleys, the making of self-governing states, 
where a few years before were unknown stretches of wilder¬ 
ness—all this is an important part of American history. 

Suggested Readings 

Histories: Paxson, The Last American Frontier. Andrews, The 
Last Quarter of a Century. Brady, Indian Fights and Indian 
Fighters. 



A Modern Electric Locomotive 
This locomotive has 4,000 horse power. 









INDUSTRIAL DEVELOPMENT: AGRICULTURE 429 


CHAPTER LII 


INDUSTRIAL DEVELOPMENT: AGRICULTURE 

740. Hardship, Success, and Failure.—The settlement of 
the great prairie region west of the Mississippi, where now 
is so much prosperity, where the boy or girl who reads 
these lines may now live in comfort or even luxury, was no 
easy matter. Settlers one by one took up claims from the 
Government, or bought a few acres, dared the cold winds of 
winter, the long dry summers, the want of almost everything, 

lived in sod houses, 
broke up the sullen 
prairie, and planted 
their crops only per¬ 
haps to see them 
ruined by grasshop¬ 
pers or drought. But 
success came in the 
end—good crops, ir¬ 
rigation ditches to 
secure the needed 
water, railroads to 
carry the surplus crop to market—in short, comfort. And yet 
with all this success we cannot forget the hardy frontiers¬ 
men of the plains who failed; for some there were who 
failed. For them this was a harsh, cruel experience. 

741. Machinery for the Great Western Farms.—The 
development of the great West has been due, in great 
measure, to the wonderful inventions of agricultural ma¬ 
chinery. The vast prairies offered the best possible oppor¬ 
tunity for using machinery, and to-day one feels like saying 
that in many of the Western states men manufacture wheat 
rather than grow it. In some cases they plow the earth with 
a steam plow. Instead of the old-time harrow, they use a 
pulverizing harrow, clod crusher, and leveler, so made that 



A Steam Traction Engine with 12 Plows 








430 INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 

it breaks up the clods, levels the earth, and fits the land at 
once for sowing. Sometimes a traction engine draws a row 
of plows, to which is attached a row of harrows, which 
in turn draw after 
them drills to sow 
the seed, and rakes 
for covering it. A 
machine of this 
kind, with sixteen 
plows in a row, will 
do as much work in 
a dav as sixteen 
plowmen with sixty- 
four horses could do. 

742. Harvesting- 
Machinery.— The 
harvesting machinery for these great farms is not less mar¬ 
velous than the rest, for everything is done by machinery. 
By one continuous operation wheat is cut, threshed, cleaned, 
and packed into bags. In the olden days (and yet not so 

very many decades 
ago) the farmer and 
his sons went out 
into the field, cut 
the grain with their 
scythes, bound it 
with their own hands, 
and stacked it. It 
was then carried on 
wagons to the barn, 
and, as the days 
went by, it was 
threshed by the weary beating of the flail. 

743. An Age of Machines.—Of course such complete 
machinery can be used only on the very large farms; and, 
even on many of these, horses furnish a large part of the 




Harrowing with a Steam Traction 
Engine 










INDUSTRIAL DEVELOPMENT: AGRICULTURE 431 


power for drawing the multiple plows and other machin¬ 
ery. 1 But on the smaller farms, the corn is planted and 
often cut by machinery, the grain is mowed and stacked, 
the potatoes are dug, the cream is separated from the milk, 
the churning is done—in short, scores of things, that only a 
few decades ago were performed in the same laborious way 
as when Columbus discovered America, are now done by 
some ingenious machine which saves time and patience and 
labor. 

744. New Problems.—Such facts as these should make us 
see how recent is our present method of living, and how many 
are the new problems that have come since men have learned 
the use of steam and electricity. We no longer live in an age 
of tools but in an age of machines and this is true of the life 
of the farmer as of the life of the city dweller. 

Thus we find about us new conditions of life quite 
different from those that existed a few years ago, when every 
farm was nearly sufficient unto itself, and when we got along 
without all these elaborate machines. 

745. The Old Flour Mill.—In the earlier growth of the Mis¬ 
sissippi Valley wheat and corn were sometimes carried to 
market; much of it went down the long river on the flat- 
boats. The corn that was used by the farmer’s family on the 
frontier farm of Ohio and Indiana was often beaten into meal 
by the farmer’s son; the corn was put into a hole in a log 

1 There is, it appears, some tendency to reduce the size of the largest 
farms. There is in Oklahoma a farm of over 50,000 acres; 500 miles of 
barbed wire were used for fencing it. Formerly North Dakota had a farm 
of over 70,000 acres, but this has been cut up into smaller farms. It has 
been said that on one of these immense farms men might breakfast at 
one end of a furrow, dine at the other end, and returning, eat their suppers 
at the starting point. Some one has figured out that if a farmer should 
try alone to cultivate such a farm by the old-fashioned methods, he 
would need sixteen years for plowing, another sixteen years for harrow¬ 
ing, and, if he began the job early enough in life, he might get the whole 
place seeded and, it may be, eat of his grain before reaching three score 
and ten. 




432 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


of wood or in a stump and pounded vigorously with a heavy 
pole, much as the old-time druggists pounded their drugs 
with pestle and mortar. The grist mill, or flour mill, as we 
now call it, soon came to help the frontiersman; dams were 
built across the streams, and the water turned the wheels 
and ground the corn and wheat for all the region round. 1 
But after a time these little mills were given up; bigger 
ones were built in places 
from which flour could 
be conveniently shipped 
by rail. 

746. The New Flour 
Mills.—The great region 
west of the Mississippi 
grew with the railroad, 
and, as we have said, in 
considerable measure be¬ 
cause of the railroad; the 
cars were there ready to 
carry the grain to market. 

Grain elevators holding 
hundreds of thousands 
of bushels were therefore 
built at the shipping cen¬ 
ters like Chicago. At 
Minneapolis and St. Paul 
—“ The Twin Cities ”—and at some other places, elevators 
were put up, and mills were built that turned out thousands 
of barrels of flour each day. 

747. A Story of Almost Magical Growth.— And yet, when 


1 Any boy who has paddled a canoe down the streams of the states 
east of the Mississippi has seen, time and again, the abandoned 
dam of the old mill where he must now with some vexation of spirit 
“carry ” his canoe, or risk a glorious shoot through the rapids. These 
abandoned mill sites illustrate how many kinds of business have in re¬ 
cent years left the country and come to center in the cities. 

























INDUSTRIAL DEVELOPMENT: AGRICULTURE 433 


all is said, it gives us little idea of the immensity of the farming 
business, as it has developed in the last few years, to give 
figures to show how many million bushels of wheat are carried 
by the trains to the enormous elevators of Minneapolis or 
Chicago; how many millions of barrels of flour are rolled out 
of the big flouring mills of the Northwest; how many millions 
of bushels of corn and tons of hay are raised on Western lands 
where only a generation ago there were no inhabitants but 
the prairie dog and the coyote. The story reads like a tale 
of magic. 

748. The Cowboy.—Every boy and girl knows something 
of the great cattle-raising industry of the West; he has heard 
of mustangs and bronchos, of cowboys who were sure shots 
and hard riders, of days of adventure and toil. In fact, the 
cowboy has been an important personage in American his¬ 
tory from the days of the earliest West, when the West 
indeed was still east of the Appalachian Mountains. The 
care of cattle has always been one of the tasks of the fron¬ 
tier. Even in the earliest days, a hundred years ago, hogs 
and cattle in great droves were driven many miles to mar¬ 
ket—sometimes hundreds of them—from the farms of the 
Mississippi Valley over the mountains to the older settle¬ 
ments. 

749. Great Cattle Ranches.—When the great West was 
opened up and when the railroads were built into the region, 
cattle raising was done on a large scale. Cattle in immense 
herds were driven to the railroad and sent to Omaha or 
Kansas City or Chicago. The beef-packing business became 
one of the great industries of the land; to-day, the country 
market often receives its meat from the city packing house; 
fresh beef goes whirling across the country in refrigerator 
cars—huge ice boxes on wheels—is hurried aboard the ocean 
steamers, and carried over the sea to feed the people of 
Europe. 

750. The Food Products of America.—While our imagina¬ 
tion is stirred by the picture of the great wheat fields plowed 


434 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


and sown and reaped by machinery, we cannot leave out of 
consideration Indian corn—the food on which it might be 
said America has been built. 1 The earliest corn fields, where 
the corn was planted in hurried fashion in the half-cleared 
farms, have given place to wide acres of waving grain, stretch¬ 
ing away nearly to the horizon. The corn crop is so large 





A Chicago Meat-Packing Plant 

that figures simply daze the mind; but some idea may be 
gained from the fact that if the crop of a single year were 
placed in wagons, each holding forty bushels of shelled corn, 
the line of wagons with horses attached could encircle the 
the world five times. One cannot help thinking how 
amazed Captain John Smith and good William Bradford 
would have been if some fairy had opened their eyes to see 


1 It almost seems that if it had not been for Indian corn, America 
could not have been settled in the seventeenth century, so far was it 
from the base of supplies. The pioneer as he advanced took corn, de¬ 
pended on it, and raised it on the prairie or between the stumps, while 
the farm was getting into condition. 








INDUSTRIAL DEVELOPMENT: AGRICULTURE 435 

these great fields and these vast granaries of corn that were 
to enrich the country they helped to found. 

751. The South Finds New Prosperity.—While the West 
was growing, the South began to recover from the effects of 
the war and to reach out for its share of prosperity. In popu¬ 
lation the Southern states have not advanced as have the 
North and West, for foreign immigrants have not yet learned 
to go in any number to the South; but there has been steady 
progress. Cotton, the great crop, is raised in quantities un¬ 
heard of before the war, and, what is more, the South instead 
of shipping all its cotton to England or the North has 
begun to make its own cotton into cloth. Factories have 
been built here and there. Even South Carolina, where there 
were practically no factories before the war, is now dotted with 
cotton factories, and the hum of the spindle can be heard in 
many a village. Though the factory does not always bring 
happiness and peace to the poor white man when he leaves 
his ill-paid work on the farm and takes up the work as a mill 
hand, the factory does bring more wealth to the South and 
gives promise of days of plenty. 

752. The South Finds Wealth Beyond the Cotton Field.— 
Some of the Southern cities, Atlanta and Birmingham and 
Nashville, have become thriving centers of trade, not at all 
like the sleepy towns of the old South before the war. The 
treasures of the earth are found to be not only rice and sugar 
and cotton, but coal and iron and oil and lumber. Birming¬ 
ham is one of the centers of the iron industry of America. 
The cotton seed that was formerly thrown away has been 
found to be useful and profitable. Oil made from the seed 
is used for many purposes; sometimes, it is said, it masquer¬ 
ades on our tables as olive oil fresh from the groves of Italy. 
The value of the cotton seed and its products alone, in the 
course of a single year, would pay more than the whole amount 
of the national debt when Hamilton became Secretary of the 
Treasury. Thus, the South has been making more of her 
great natural wealth, and year by year has more to sell and 


436 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


more to clo. Fortunately, in less material ways there has 
also been progress. More money has been spent on educa¬ 
tion for the support of schools and colleges, churches and 
libraries. 


CHAPTER LIII 

NEW INDUSTRIAL CONDITIONS, POLITICAL AND SOCIAL 

REFORMS 

753. New Uses for Steel.—In recent years the world has 
turned to the use of steel. We might call the last quarter of 
a century the age of steel. At the close of the Civil War less 
than one half a million tons were made per year in the whole 
world; thirty-five years later there were seventy times as 

much, and America produced nearly 
one-half of the whole world’s output. 
Steel has come to be used for many 
purposes—railroads, bridges, ships, 
building structures, cars, and auto¬ 
mobiles. In the cities towering struc¬ 
tures are raised, twenty, thirty, and 
even forty stories high, skeletons of 
bolted steel. Ships of enormous size 
are built of steel—ships big enough to 
give room to whole villages of people, 
ships that can contain within their 
sides a hundred such crafts as that 
which bore the adventurous Columbus 
across the Atlantic, ships that can be 
driven by their huge throbbing en¬ 
gines through the stormiest water 
in a few days from New York to 
Queenstown. 

754. The Commerce of the Great Lakes.—The growth of 
the iron industry, and the wheat and flour industry as well, 
had the effect of building up the commerce of the Great 











NEW INDUSTRIAL CONDITIONS 


437 


Lakes till it reached a height that few appear to realize. 
The total weight of the ships on the Great Lakes alone is 


greater than that of the entire merchant fleet of any nation 



The Modern Ocean Steamship 


A cross section of the Lusitania, showing 
the comparative size of Hudson’s Halj 
Moon. 


properly should we say 
not handling , for the 
hands have little to do 
but to guide machines. 1 

755. Growth in Population; the Problem of the Big City. 
•—We have spoken of the rapid growth of the West; the 
Eastern states and the older cities did not stand still. The 


in the world save Great Britain. All day and all night 
long, ship after ship 
passes through the Soo 
Locks and the Detroit 
River bearing the wheat 
and flour of the North¬ 
west, the iron of north¬ 
ern Michigan, Wiscon¬ 
sin, and Minnesota to 
the ports of New York 
and Ohio. Coal and 
other products of the 
East are carried thus to 
the North and West. 

As the lake commerce 
increased new methods 
of handling the iron ore 
were invented—more 


1 At the ports of Lake Erie and in Chicago wonderful machines are 
used: A long steel bridge with arms is lowered into the hold of a vessel. 
Along the arms and the bridge runs a sort of trolley train, with great 
scoops that seize upon the ore, carry tons of it at a time to the surface, 
and hurry it along to the mountainous stock heap. The largest coal 
cars are lifted by powerful machines 30 or 40 feet above the rails that 
bear them, and then they are tipped on the side and emptied into giant 
funnels which carry the coal into the holds of ships. 


















438 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


older states also grew rapidly. Between 1880 and the end 
of the century the population of the United States was 
increased by twenty-six million, or by more than there were 
in the whole country in 1850. Many immigrants entered 



A Lake Ore Carrier 


the country. By the end of the nineteenth century there 
were in New York City nearly one hundred and seven 
thousand people from Austria-Hungary, one hundred and 
fifty-five thousand from Russia, three hundred and twenty- 
two thousand from Germany. The crowding of these poor 
people into New York and other cities brought new and 
difficult problems. What was to be done for these people 
who had come with high hopes to the land of plenty and 
progress? Sturdy philanthropists took the field and began 
the battle for better conditions, to secure parks and breath¬ 
ing spaces and places of innocent amusement, to do some¬ 
thing for the uplifting of these hordes of new citizens. 

756. Removing “The Shame of the Cities.”—A great 
political reform movement of recent times is the effort 
throughout the Union to purify the city governments. For 
many years their treasuries had been robbed by “rings,” 
groups of corrupt politicians, and by “bosses,” cunning 
political leaders, who filled their wallets with plunder. 





NEW INDUSTRIAL CONDITIONS 


439 


Cities were unhealthy and unclean, and education was 
neglected. Efforts at reform were intermittent. About 
1900 a movement began, however, which has accomplished, 
and still promises great reforms. After the famous Gal¬ 
veston flood, a committee of experts was given the work of 
governing the city during its reconstruction. So marked was 
its success that Des Moines, Iowa, gave the “Commission 
Form of Government” a trial, and many other cities, espe¬ 
cially in the West, followed. 1 The people act directly in 
deciding many important matters, as in granting franchises 
to street railroads. Cleaner streets, more efficient schools, 
and reduced taxes are among the advantages claimed for 
city government by commission. The great eastern cities 
like New York and Philadelphia found other means of re¬ 
forming the city governments, so that they, too, show 
great improvement over the old system. 

757. The Concentration of Business.—The invention of 
machinery for doing hundreds of things has had some 
interesting results. It has made, or helped to make, great 
cities full of stores and factories. The old-fashioned way of 
making things in the house or at the tinker’s shop in the 
village is given up. Just as we have seen the flour mills 
leaving the little streams and becoming big mills at great 
centers, so other industries were in large degree brought 
together. Even the druggist no longer makes his pills and 
mixes his powders, for he now buys them ready-made from 
factories in Detroit or Chicago. 

758. The Big Corporation: The Trust Problem.—There 
grew up big corporations to manage these big undertakings, 
pay for all this costly machinery, and sell all the goods. A 
large part of the business of the country thus passed into the 
hands of corporations. The change took place chiefly after 

1 By the Commission plan a small number of men, five or seven, is 
chosen by the people in a general city election without reference to 
wards, and this Commission is charged with the government and the 
management of the city. 



440 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


the Civil War and especially in the last quarter of a century. 
Moreover, corporations doing the same work often came 
under one control, that is to say, they formed a “trust,” as it 
was termed. These trusts often had great power and influ¬ 
ence, for the man of Dakota or Texas might be affected by 
what was done by the manufacturer of steel or cloth or 
machinery a thousand miles away. For many decades peo¬ 
ple had been accustomed to rely on competition to keep 
prices down and control business. If many men or many 
corporations were making the same articles, each would 
have an inducement to sell more cheaply than his competitor 
in order to get the business and make the money. But when 
a great corporation controlled all, or nearly all, of the busi¬ 
ness in a certain field, what hope was there that prices would 
be low or goods be well made? Thus the people reasoned 
about what we call the “Trust Problem.” 

759. Trusts and “Big Business.”—Many think that our 
greatest danger is the union of big business and politics. 
They fear that the rich will control our government for 
their own interests, just as a few lords, owners of vast 
tracts of land, made government serve their ends in ages 
past. Everybody has been aroused to this danger by the 
so-called “muck-raking” magazines and reform politicians. 
The most dangerous foes of our Republic are held to be the 
trusts which stifle all competition, crowd out all small 
makers and traders. If they could wholly gain control of 
the legislatures and of the executives, and of the courts, in 
both state and nation, they could fix at will the wages of 
laborers and the price of all needful things, so that we would 
all be at their mercy. To end this “menace of privilege” 
has been the aim of much political agitation and law-making 
of recent time. The Federal tax on corporations, the Sher¬ 
man Law and prosecutions under it, the proposals and acts 
for governmental regulation, all aim the same way. As 
President Wilson has so clearly stated it: “We design that 
the limitations on private enterprise shall be removed, so 


NEW INDUSTRIAL CONDITIONS 


441 


that the next generation of youngsters, as they come along, 
will not have to become proteges of benevolent trusts, but 
will be free to go about making their own lives what they 
will; so that we may taste again the full cup, not of charity 
but of liberty.” 

760. Political Reform.—Government should serve all 
society and not merely the business interests. To this end 
there has been a great move to purify politics, to drive out 
of politics those who merely serve “big business.” To get 
government out of the hands of the few, and into the hands 
of the many, a multitude of plans have been suggested, and 
in various states they have been tried. The chief measures 
are, the “Initiative,” to permit the people to propose and 
make laws for themselves, the “Referendum,” to enable the 
people to refuse an unapproved act of their legislature, the 
"Recall,” to permit the people to deprive of office a man 
who has displeased them after his election, the “Direct 
Primaries,” to take the power of nomination from the pro¬ 
fessional politician, and give it to the people. “Down with 
the boss-ridden Nominating Convention,” was one of the 
rallying cries of the Progressive Party in the election of 
1912. A national reform of this sort was the amendment to 
secure the election of Senators by the body of the people of 
a state rather than by the legislature, because it was 
believed that at least in some instances legislators had given 
way to improper influences. Even the courts, state and 
national, have been under fire. They have been accused of 
making law by the nature of their decisions, and of holding 
back social and economic reform by deciding against the 
constitutionality of laws which the great majority of men 
wanted. Some have demanded the recall of such judges, 
while a more accepted suggestion is to recall their decisions 
by popular vote. Many conservative men see great danger 
to our institutions in these reforms. 

761. Social Reforms and Problems.—Social and economic 
problems, too, have loomed large in recent years and great 


442 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


progress has been made toward solving some of them. (1) 
One of the greatest problems is that of immigration. The 
Irish, German, English and Scandinavian immigration, 
which brought peoples allied to us in race, religion, and 
political traditions, and which did so much to build up our 
nation’s strength, is giving place to immigration of races 
not so nearly allied to us. Congress has turned its atten¬ 
tion to the regulation of immigration, and laws restricting 
immigration have been passed. (2) The negro problem is 
being earnestly studied by some of the best minds, North 
and South. The occurrence from time to time of lynchings 
and race riots in the Northern states as well as the Southern 
is condemned by the public and the press of both the South 
and the North. In the Southern states negroes are, by 
various legislative enactments, kept wholly out of politics, 
and are denied many social privileges. It is coming more 
and more to be believed that white and black must be kept 
severed socially and that the dominant race must see to it 
that the negro be given a helping hand toward educating 
him and making him useful in industry. In the Philippine 
Islands, where we have a different race problem, great prog¬ 
ress seems to have been made in educating and developing 
the natives politically. There is a strong feeling in the 
United States that the Philippines ought to be given self- 
government as soon as there is reasonable prospect of suc¬ 
cess. (3) Great labor problems have taxed all the ingenuity 
of statesmen and social workers. The strained relations of 
labor and capital have caused great strikes and riots and 
crimes that have frightened society. During America’s 
participation in the Great War labor received increased 
wages, but it also patriotically declared a truce in its struggle 
for concessions from the owners of the great industrial works 
wherein they were employed. The problem of child-labor 
has led to much legislation to prevent cruel treatment, too 
long hours and unsanitary conditions in the mills, but 
much remains to be done. (4) To safeguard the health of 


NEW INDUSTRIAL CONDITIONS 


443 


American people, a national Food and Drug Act has been 
passed. A national Bureau of Health has been proposed to 
spread information that will preserve public health. The na¬ 
tional government and state governments have done much 
to further the development of scientific agriculture, to make 
the harvests greater, and the losses by pests smaller. Many 
individuals have given their attention to scientific methods 
of doing business, of manufacturing, and of conducting 
trade. By these devices the working power of men is greatly 
increased. The last generation has seen a nation-wide 
campaign to prohibit the sale of intoxicating liquors. Maine 
and Kansas and scattered states adopted local prohibition 
and gradually there came to be a solid block of Southern 
states wherein no liquor could be bought or sold. Finally, 
during the Great War an amendment to the national Con¬ 
stitution passed through Congress and in an incredibly 
short time had secured the requisite approval of three- 
fourths of the states and became the 18th Amendment. 

762. The Railroad Problem.—With the growth of the 
railroads came a problem with which we are still wrestling. 
In some foreign countries the government owns the roads, in 
whole or in part; but in America the roads were long allowed 
to grow without restriction and to develop their own 
methods. Yet in this country the transportation problem 
is one of very great importance and of very great difficulty, 
requiring possibly in a peculiar degree the oversight of 
government. Men began to complain twenty years ago 
that railroads, for their own gain, would favor one shipper 
at the expense of his neighbors. Secret and special rates, 
instead of equal treatment for all, were grounds of frequent 
complaint. 

763. The Interstate Commerce Commission.—The United 
States Government has a right to regulate interstate com¬ 
merce, that is to say, traffic and intercourse between states. 1 


1 Constitution, Art. I, Sec. 8, Cl. 3. 




444 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


In 1887 an interstate commerce law was passed. It was 
intended to bring about fair treatment to all shippers, and it 
provided for a commission to oversee the workings of the 
law. Gradually the Commission was given greater powers. 
With the needs of the Government in the Great War, the 
great railway systems of the country were taken over by 
the national administration and run by it. Public opinion 
became divided as to whether there should be permanent 
government ownership of railroads. 

764. Marvelous Discoveries and Inventions.—As we look 
back on the changes of a generation we are struck with the 
marvels of man’s accomplishments. How would Washing¬ 
ton and Jefferson have been impressed had they been told 
that men would get oil out of the ground to make light; 
that out of the same oil would come gasoline to drive 
automobiles, motor boats and aeroplanes; that whirling 
wheels would make electricity that would be turned into 
light and power; that we should be hurried across the con¬ 
tinent in luxurious cars in four days’ time; that men would 
make clothes and shoes by machinery; that men would 
actually fly like birds and go through the air faster than a 
bird can fly; that, though thousands of miles of tossing 
waves lie between, ship would talk to ship by wireless 
telegraphy; that, in fact, men would come to talk easily with 
one another across the whole continent. Men and women 
are still living who, as boys and girls, had to scurry away to 
a neighbor’s “to get fire,” because the fire which they had 
banked for the night was out. 

Modern Americans have not only invented machines 
but they have also pushed on the work of discovery. In 
1909 Commander Peary announced to the world his dis¬ 
covery of the North Pole. 

765. There Are Other Good Things Besides Money and 
Machinery.—All of these tales of enormous growth and 
great wealth should not entirely deceive us. We may be big 
and even rich without being great. Athens in the days when 


NEW INDUSTRIAL CONDITIONS 


445 


it was the home of the great writers that have enriched the 
world for two thousand years, and of great artists and build¬ 
ers whose works are still the admiration and despair of men, 
was only a small city by modern standards—perhaps two 
hundred thousand people; the whole of Attica had not more 
than one quarter as many people as has Chicago; the whole 
of Greece is about one-half the size of Michigan. Without 
wealth, however, in these days there cannot be science and 
study and art. Great libraries and laboratories, public 
schools and universities must be supported by public taxes 
or endowed by wealthy men. Thus in the corn crop and 
the iron factory, in work and wages and products, we see 
the hope of America’s intellectual growth. Libraries are 
growing in numbers; the number of students in the schools 
and colleges increases greatly every year; from the labora¬ 
tories come new inventions, new knowledge, more intimate 
acquaintance with Nature and her laws. 

766. Changes of a Century.—The nation, as we see it 
to-day, has grown marvelously since Washington signed 
the Constitution in 1787. Then there was a row of states 
along the Atlantic seaboard; life was simple; there was 
not much wealth; there was no real poverty. Washington 
and Hamilton and Jefferson were looking forward to the 
experiment of self-government. To-day the states reach 
across to the Pacific; there is a population of over one 
hundred million people; the country is the richest in the 
world and probably the most powerful. Wonderful changes 
have come through the invention of machines and through 
science. But in some ways things have not changed. To¬ 
day we should feel just as strongly as did the men of the 
simpler days gone by—that virtue must be the foundation 
for the republic that will live and prosper. Millions of 
machines and tens of millions of acres cannot change the 
first law of human progress—that it is righteousness that 
exalteth a nation. 


446 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


CHAPTER LIY 
RECENT POLITICAL HISTORY 

767. McKinley’s Assassination.—In 1900 Mr. McKinley 

was again elected to the presidency, his opponent being Mr. 
Bryan as in the previous election. His second term was 
hardly more than fairly started when he was assassinated at 
Buffalo, September 6, 1901. The assassin was an anarchist, 
a young man who had had his head filled with wild ideas 
about mending the world’s ills by using violence. The Presi¬ 
dent was deeply mourned, for the purity and manliness of 
his character had won the admiration of the nation. 

768. Roosevelt Succeeds.—He was immediately suc¬ 
ceeded by Theodore Roosevelt, the Vice President. On 

previous occasions when the Vice 
Presidents assumed the duties 
and the title of the presidency 
there was much questioning as to 
their fitness for the new duties. 
So it was with Air. Roosevelt 
though he was not unknown. 
Soon, however, he convinced the 
nation of his strength and his 
fitness for office. He showed 
untiring industry, remarkable 
mental powers, unusual breadth 
of interest and sympathy. He was 
reelected in 1904 by an overwhelming vote. His opponent 
was Judge Alton B. Parker of New York. 

769. Roosevelt’s Administration.—There were many 
important things done in the seven years of Mr. Roosevelt’s 
administration, for he was always eager to act and to do 
what would build up the nation. He was ably assisted by 






RECENT POLITICAL HISTORY 447 

John Hay, 1 Elihu Root, and other members of an able 
Cabinet. The annexation of the Philippines and the up¬ 
risings and political changes in China demanded that the 
United States should take a new and important place in 
the world’s politics. 

As the events of the Civil War made more clear the need 
of a railroad to the 
Pacific, so the Span¬ 
ish War showed 
more sharply than 
before the need of 
a canal through the 
Isthmus of Pana¬ 
ma. 2 The matter 
had long been dis¬ 
cussed; the time for 
action was now 
come. A treaty was 
made with the little 
Republic of Panama 
giving the United 
States control of a 
strip of land from ocean to ocean (1903). Money was voted 
by Congress and the work was begun. This greatest en¬ 
gineering feat of all ages is now completed, ships daily cross 
the isthmus, and many paths of the world’s commerce are 
changed. 

770. Achievements of Roosevelt’s Administration. —Of 



1 John Hay was one of the greatest Secretaries of State in our history. 
His policy of downright and outspoken diplomacy at first startled the 
diplomats of Europe, who were accustomed to roundabout language 
and studied sentences. But they greatly respected Hay whose frank¬ 
ness never was rude. 

2 The Battleship Oregon had steamed from San Francisco to Cuba, 
15,000 miles at racing speed, to give aid to Sampson. A canal would 
have saved much of this distance. 











448 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


the achievements of President Roosevelt’s administrations, 
these may be briefly mentioned as most significant: (1) 
The settlement of the coal strike in Pennsylvania in 1902. 
This was done largely through the personal influence of 
Mr. Roosevelt, for he had strictly no official right to inter¬ 
fere. The strike lasted long and was very disastrous, but 



The Great Culebra Cut on the Panama Canal 


was finally settled by a commission appointed by Mr. 
Roosevelt for the purpose. 1 (2) In 1905, through the media¬ 
tion of the President, the disastrous war between Japan 
and Russia was brought to an end. The treaty was signed 
at Portsmouth, New Hampshire. 2 (3) Far-reaching plans 

1 The strike lasted for months and was felt by almost every house¬ 
holder in the land. On September 26th, several schools in New York 
City were closed that coal might be saved for colder weather. Hard 
coal sold as high as $25 per ton. 

2 The United States had heartily favored the principle of International 
Arbitration. Representatives were sent to the Peace Conference at The 
Hague (1899) and treaties have been made with other countries to sub¬ 
mit certain disputes to an international tribunal at The Hague for arbi¬ 
tration. In 1902 Mexico and the United States resorted to The Hague 
Tribunal to settle a dispute which in olden times would have been 
settled by force. 






Longitude 120 East 160° Longitude 1C0° West 120° from 80° Greenwich 40° 0 Longitude 40° East 

































































450 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


for irrigating the dry regions of the West were taken up and 
carried forward with zeal and success. (4) The nation was 
reminded that the vast natural resources of the country, 
especially the forests, were being thoughtlessly wasted. By 
the eager efforts of Mr. Roosevelt the people were led to take 
new interest in saving the forest and the stream—perhaps 
in the long run the most important thing done during the 

whole administration. (5) A law was 
passed adding to the authority of the 
Interstate Commerce Commission. 
(6) A civil government was given to 
the people of the Philippines under 
which they were allowed to govern 
themselves in part. (7) The Presi¬ 
dent was at all times insistent upon 
a regard for law and the moral code. 
His speeches on this subject doubt¬ 
less did much good, and helped to 

William H. Taft keep alive the conscience of the nation. 

Efforts were made to enforce the laws 
against the trusts in cases where laws were thought to have 
been violated. 1 

771. The Election of President Taft.—When the election 

of 1908 approached, there was a strong desire on the part of 
the rank and file of the Republican Party to nominate Mr. 
Roosevelt, but he refused, and put forward as his candidate 
William PI. Taft, then Secretary of War. Roosevelt’s will 
was law in the party, and Taft was nominated by the 
Republican Convention in June, 1908. In the campaign, 
Taft defeated Mr. Bryan, who was running for the third 
time as the nominee of the Democratic Party. The electoral 
vote was 323 for Taft to 163 for Bryan. As soon as Mr. Taft 
was inaugurated, in March of 1909, Mr. Roosevelt departed 

1 An episode worthy of mention at this time was the earthquake in 
California, and the fire following the earthquake, which destroyed some 
$400,000,000 worth of property in San Francisco (1906.) 



































452 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


for Africa on a hunting expedition to secure rare specimens 
for the Smithsonian Institution, but also to avoid embarrass¬ 
ing Mr. Tatt by his presence. On his return in 1910, he 
passed through Europe, receiving an ovation everywhere 
such as could only be given one of the most distinguished 
citizens of the world 

772. The Payne-Aldrich Tariff.—President Taft’s admin¬ 
istration began with an extra session to revise the tariff, 
which the Republican Party had promised to reform. Mr. 
Payne, in the House of Representatives, put a bill through 
that house which lowered the duties as the country expected, 
but, when the bill came to the Senate, a faction of the party 
led by Senator Aldrich, and known as “Standpatters”— 
men who wanted to keep things as they were—raised the 
rates, and forced a conference between the Senate and the 
House, wherein Mr. Aldrich seemed victorious both over 
the House and President Taft, who sought to lower the 
rates. Mr. Taft refused to veto the compromise bill, and 
it became a law. The country felt it had been cheated, and 
when Mr. Taft, in a speech at Winona, Minnesota, praised 
the bill, he drew upon him the wrath of a large faction of 
his party, which from that time on drew away from the 
“Standpatters.” Not even a tax of one per cent, on the 
income of corporations, which accompanied the tariff bill, 
placated the enemies of the “Old Guard” as Mr. Aldrich 
and his followers were called. Even President Taft’s later 
efforts to modify the tariff by a reciprocity treaty with 
Canada 1 failed because Canada at the last moment refused 
to ratify. Moreover, the western farmers were alienated 
from the President, because they thought he had betrayed 
their interests in making the treaty. 

773. The Reform Faction of the Republican Party.— 
The opponents of the administration were called “Insur- 


1 An agreement between the two countries by which each reduced 
its tariff rates on certain things if its rival would do likewise on others. 




RECENT POLITICAL HISTORY 


453 


gents” by their enemies, but they took the name “Pro¬ 
gressives.” Their leaders, Senator La Follette, of Wiscon¬ 
sin, and other western senators, who had already led reform 
movements in their own states, revolted against the old 
leaders of the Republican Party, especially Senator Aldrich 
and Cannon, Speaker of the House. The leaders of the new 
movement in the House rose against the Speaker, whose 
autocratic powers enabled him to head off reform bills 
introduced by the “Progressives.” They succeeded in re¬ 
ducing his influence by putting his powers in control of a 
committee elected by the House. In the state elections 
of 1910, the effect of all this discontent in the Republican 
ranks was shown by the Democrats gaining a majority of 
67 in the new House of Representatives elected at that 
time. 

774. Other Important Measures of Taft’s Administration. 

—With the Republican Party divided, and the Democrats 
in a majority in the House, some very important measures 
were passed for which President Taft deserves much credit, 
though his enemies tried to rob him of it. A system of 
Postal Savings Banks was established, and a Parcels Post 
set up in spite of the Express Companies, whose opposition 
had kept us twenty years behind the rest of the world in 
this matter. 1 Besides this accomplished legislation, Mr. 
Taft won much praise from the advocates of peace by 
arranging treaties of arbitration with France and England, 
but the Senate ruined them by amendments, and they were 
dropped. It was President Taft’s fortune to have the ap¬ 
pointment of five new Justices of the Supreme Court, the 
most powerful judiciary body in the world. He did not 
escape the charge of packing the court with men who favored 
corporations. Even his well-meant, vigorous prosecution of 
the Anti-Trust cases brought him ill fortune, for in the case 

1 A department of government to look after the interests of labor was 
founded, as was also a bureau of mines, aiming to secure the safety of 
workers in that dangerous employment. 




454 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


of the forced dissolution of the Oil and Tobacco Trusts it was 
declared that the inner circle of stockholders were enriched, 
and that the prices rose instead of falling. 

775. Republican Convention and the Rupture of the 
Party.—The above misfortunes, the Ballinger scandal in 
President Taft’s cabinet, and the Archbold scandal in the 
Commerce Court, for which Taft’s administration was held 
responsible, 1 became a heavy burden when the time came, 
for the election of a new president. Mr. Taft naturally 
sought a renomination, and the leaders of the “Stand¬ 
patters” gave him their support, though some of his meas¬ 
ures were displeasing to them. Senators La Follette and 
Cummins became candidates for nomination in opposition 
to Mr. Taft. Both were popular among the Progressives in 
the West, but Roosevelt, whose exciting ventures in the 
African jungles, and flattering reception by the princes and 
peoples of Europe, had made more of a popular hero than 
ever, was believed by many Progressives in the East to be 
the only candidate who could hope to be nominated in place 
of Taft. For a time Roosevelt was silent as to his candidacy, 
but when seven governors, of a Progressive stamp, and 
representatives of some twenty-four states, met and urged 
him to accept, he said the election should be left to Republi¬ 
cans voting in primary elections in the several states. 
A great cry went up from La Follette and his followers that 
in 1908 Roosevelt had said he would not accept renomina¬ 
tion, and that all precedent was against a third term. 
Nevertheless in the thirteen states which held primary elec¬ 
tions, Roosevelt was given 278 delegates, Taft 48, and 
La Follette 36, and Roosevelt became a frank and active 
candidate. But, in the main, the states which held no 


1 Secretary Ballinger was charged with favoring a rich syndicate seek¬ 
ing coal lands in Alaska. Judge Archbold of the Commerce Court was 
convicted of the charge of receiving money from parties having cases 
before that court. 



RECENT POLITICAL HISTORY 


455 


primaries 1 selected, at the state conventions, Taft delegates. 
When the National Convention met in June, 1912, there 
were many contested seats, and as the Convention was 
conducted by the old party organization—the “Regulars” 
as they called themselves—the Taft delegates were for the 
most part recognized. The Roosevelt supporters claimed 
that the primary vote showed that the people wanted the 
Progressive candidate, but the Convention as organized 
refused to admit this claim. When the Convention upheld 
the decisions of the National Committee as to contested 
delegates, the Progressives, led by Roosevelt, left the Con¬ 
vention, which then calmly nominated Taft. 

776. The Progressive Convention. A New Party.— 
Roosevelt and his partisans denounced the work of the Re¬ 
publican Convention as a theft of the nomination. The 
Roosevelt followers resolved to organize a new party, and 
to this end held a convention in August at Chicago. This 
gathering had all the fire and zeal of a crusade. Roosevelt 
made a thrilling speech indorsing many radical movements 
of the day, such as the recall of judicial decisions, initiative 
and referendum, a short ballot, presidential primaries and 
popular election of Senators. Eighteen of the delegates were 
women, and woman suffrage was indorsed. Roosevelt de¬ 
manded that machine politics be overthrown, that govern¬ 
ment respond to the will of the people, that social justice be 
secured, and that labor be given shorter hours and better 
wages. His enemies declared that he approved any measure 
that would get votes, and that many of the reforms de¬ 
manded were state affairs, and not the business of the na¬ 
tional party to advocate. The new party called itself the 


1 This was especially true in the South where nearly every state was 
sure to be Democratic, and where no Republican electors were likely 
to be returned. But this had long been one of the scandals of the 
Republican Nominating Convention. The delegates to the Conven¬ 
tion were almost always mere tools of the party machine. 



456 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


Progressive Party, but was dubbed the “Bull Moose” 
Party because Roosevelt had used that expression to de¬ 
scribe his feelings of exaltation. 

777. The Democratic Convention.—After the Republican 
Convention, but before that of the Progressives, the Demo¬ 
cratic Convention was held at Baltimore. This party also 

had its conservative and pro¬ 
gressive factions. Champ Clark 
of Missouri was at first in the lead 
with over a hundred more votes 
than Woodrow Wilson, his chief 
rival in the Progressive faction, 
but the rules of the Democratic 
Party Convention require that 
the successful candidate shall have 
two-thirds of all the votes of the 
delegates. At last the Wilson 
forces, aided by Mr. Bryan, won 
the day. The chosen candidate, 
a Southerner by birth, had been 
a brilliant writer upon political 
science, President of Princeton 
University, and as Governor of 
the state of New Jersey, an efficient leader of reform move¬ 
ment against the state political machine. 

778. The Campaign and Democratic Triumph.—The 
campaign was unfortunately marked by personal attacks 
and abuse. People seemed to vote rather for the candidate 
who had their confidence than for any set principles. The 
judicial system, which had been more severely criticized 
during Taft’s regime than for forty years before, was much 
discussed. The Republicans denounced judicial recall, 
which was found in the Progressive platform. They 
ignored the initiative and referendum which the Progres¬ 
sives advocated to the end that the people might more fully 
control legislation. Both the Progressives and the Demo- 







RECENT POLITICAL HISTORY 457 

crats favored a national proportional income tax, and the 
popular election of senators. Woman’s suffrage was in¬ 
dorsed by the Progressives. 1 2 The election on November 
5th resulted in the anticipated triumph of the Democrats. 
Wilson received 435 electoral votes, Roosevelt 88, and 
Taft 8. The Democrats also found themselves in a good 
working majority in both the House and the Senate. A 
notable result of the election was a great increase of the 
Socialists’ vote, mounting now to nearly a million. 


Map of the Election of 1912 

779. Reduction of the Tariff. —When President Wilson 
was inaugurated, March 4, 1913, he showed himself eager 
to redeem the party pledges made in the campaign. He 
summoned Congress in a special session (April 17, 1913) to 
revise the tariff. When they had met, he revived the custom 


1 Amendments to these ends, set in motion during Taft’s administra¬ 
tion by the tedious method provided by the Constitution, were already 
on their way to completion, and early in the next administration became 
part of the Constitution as the 16th and 17th Amendments. 

2 The question of granting the franchise to women had been agitated 
with growing success since the first “Women’s Rights” Convention in 


Democratic 1*35 
Progressive 88 
Republican 8 






























458 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


of President Washington, and went before Congress in 
person to read his message. The country and Congress 
were agog, but they liked his courage. The charm of his 
personality and the persuasiveness of his speech at once 
gained him a hold on the national legislature. As the work 
of making the new tariff went on, it became evident that 
the interested manufacturers had “lobbyists” in Washing¬ 
ton, scheming men, seeking to influence Congressmen in 
their favor. Wilson stopped this by, as he expressed it, 
the “mere pitiless turning on of the light.” Then with 
remarkable harmony, Congress proceeded to a real revision 
of the tariff, reducing the rates to a point lower than at 
any time since the Civil War. 

780. Other Measures for the Regulation of Business.— 
To prevent the government’s revenues from falling below 
its needs, a bill was passed at this session providing a na¬ 
tional income tax, thus taking advantage of the new amend¬ 
ment to the Constitution permitting such a levy. From 
this accomplishment Congress turned to consider a new 
currency bill. In President Wilson’s words: “For a gen¬ 
eration or more we have known and admitted that we have 
the worst banking and currency system in the world.” 
At times we had too much currency and at others far too 
little. To make it elastic was the work of Congress, and it 
seems the judgment of the business world that the bill 
finally passed succeeded in reaching this end. Finally, 

1848, but until lately the subject had not received the attention of the 
general public. Kentucky, in 1838, granted to women a form of school 
suffrage, an idea later adopted by 17 states, while in four states 
they were allowed the privilege, if they were taxpayers, of voting on 
bonding and taxpaying propositions. Full suffrage was given to women 
on the same terms as men in Wyoming in 1869, in Colorado in 1893, and 
in Idaho and LTtah in 1896. After the turn of the century the move¬ 
ment advanced much more rapidly. By 1919, woman suffrage had 
been granted in 29 states. In that year Congress submitted a woman- 
suffrage amendment to the Constitution, which was adopted as the 
Nineteenth Amendment in 1920. 



RECENT POLITICAL HISTORY 


459 


Congress sought, to use Mr. Wilson’s words, “to make men 
in a small way of business as free to succeed as men in a big 
way, and to kill monopoly in the seed.” With intent to 
accomplish this end, two measures were passed: the Trade 
Commission Bill and the Clayton Bill. 1 “They check the 
process by which monopoly was built up,” declared the 
President. Through all this work President Wilson led, 
and it seems safe to say that no other president in our 
history, except Jefferson, has shown such remarkable con¬ 
trol over his party in Congress as this “schoolmaster” 
executive, as the press have dubbed him. 

781. The Foreign Policy of President Wilson.—From 
this creditable record in domestic legislation, we turn to the 
much debated record of the administration in foreign affairs. 
President Wilson inherited from President Taft two serious 
problems, one, the menacing condition of affairs in Mexico, 
the other, a controversy with Japan over legislation by 
California adverse to the Japanese living in that state. The 
state act 2 was held to be in contradiction to the terms of a 
treaty between the National Government and Japan. Mr. 
Bryan, Secretary of State, made every effort to prevent the 
passing of the bill by the California legislature, and failing, 
told the Japanese Government that its citizens could resort 
to the United States courts to secure their rights under the 
treaty. But Japan felt that the Mongolian race was insulted 
by this discrimination against it. There were rumors of war 
and the Japanese people acted ominously, but their states- 
. men took a wiser view, though the controversy has dragged 
along unsettled. With China, too, our relations were in 
some respects not quite so friendly as they bad been for some 


1 The election of November 3, 1914, seemed to indicate that the people 
of the East at least did not approve of Wilson’s work, but the party 
responsible for a new tariff has often suffered in the next election. The 
spring local elections of 1915 were, however, also unfavorable to the 
Democrats. 

2 An Act meant to prevent Japanese from owning land in California. 



460 


INDUSTRIAL AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS 


years. Back in 1900, an uprising in China, called the Boxer 
Rebellion, had led to the necessity of sending an inter¬ 
national army to rescue the legations in Pekin. Pekin was 
occupied, and the several countries, France, Germany, 
Russia, England and the United States, made a demand for 
indemnity. A partition of China was threatened. John 
Hay, Secretary of State for the American government, in¬ 
sisted upon the “open door” policy, the integrity of China, 
and giving all nations an equal chance in Chinese trade. 
This policy triumphed, and the nations accepted an indem¬ 
nity from China to pay for the expenses incurred in subduing 
the Boxers. When America returned a large part of its 
indemnity, China was grateful, and the American hold in 
the Orient seemed very strong. But when in President 
Wilson’s administration the United States Government 
hesitated to recognize the recently formed Chinese Republic, 
and refused to give national approval to a loan 1 to China, 
as other nations did, the United States prestige suffered. 
Both Japan and China grew suspicious of America, and its 
diplomatic relations with them suffered. There is reason 
to suspect that intrigues by the German government had 
much to do with this ill-feeling. 

782. Mexico and Relations with South America.—Mexico 
was even more of a thorn in the side of Wilson’s adminis¬ 
tration. Toward the close of Taft’s term, the warfare 
between rival political factions in Mexico was causing 
serious loss to American interests in that country, and even 
American lives were endangered. President Diaz, who 
long had kept Mexico peaceful by a despotism under the 
guise of a republican government, was driven out, and 
Madero, leader of a revolutionary faction, became the head 
of the Mexican government. He, in turn, was overthrown, 
and General Huerta usurped his place. Madero was 


1 Wilson refused to lend his administration to the old “Dollar Diplo¬ 
macy,” as he called such government protection of capitalists. 



RECENT POLITICAL HISTORY 


461 


assassinated in the streets of Mexico City on the way to 
prison under guard. Huerta was accused of being respon¬ 
sible for his assassination. Though a number of the great 
nations of Europe recognized the government set up by 
Huerta, President Wilson refused recognition on the ground 
that Huerta was a red-handed murderer. This idealism was 
admired by many, but was disliked by all who had interests 
in Mexico, and who thought Huerta was the strong man able 
to bring order out of the social chaos there. President Wil¬ 
son put his hope in Carranza, a rebel leader, who called his 
partisans “Constitutionalists,” and whose aim, he said, was 
to pull down the old system of government which seemed to 
benefit only a few wealthy land-owners. Carranza and his 
leading general, Villa, made some progress toward over¬ 
throwing Huerta, but it was slow, and meanwhile England 
and France and the great American business interests 
pressed for armed interference by the United States Govern¬ 
ment to settle the turmoil in Mexico. 

783. War on Diplomacy. Wilson adopted a policy of 
“watchful waiting,” until at last some of Huerta’s forces 
seized a few American sailors at Tampico, and our Govern¬ 
ment demanded apologies and a salute of the American flag. 
While Huerta temporized, our naval forces seized Vera 
Cruz, and war with Mexico seemed inevitable. Then three 
powers of South America offered to mediate, and Wilson 
accepted their offers. Delegates from these three countries, 
the United States and Mexico, met at Niagara Falls, and at 
last devised a way to establish a new government in Mexico. 
Meanwhile, new developments forced Huerta to leave 
Mexico, and Carranza’s forces entered the City of Mexico. 
Then Carranza and Villa quarreled, and the attempts at 
election of a constitutional president failed. Villa formed 
a revolutionary force which, in addition to war on Car¬ 
ranza, raided our towns on the Mexican frontier and 
killed American citizens and soldiers. A force under 
General Pershing was sent into Mexico to destroy Villa 


462 THE UNITED STATES AND THE GREAT WAR 


and his force. The rebels were driven into the mountain 
wilds and then Pershing’s force was recalled. Our govern¬ 
ment’s restraint was ridiculed by some, but South American 
states at least seemed favorably impressed. That conduct 
together with our acceptance of South American mediation 
seems to have created a friendlier feeling there. The recent 
establishment of a Bureau of American Republics by our 
government marks an attempt to better our political and 
commercial relations with South America. Our adherence 
to the Monroe Doctrine seems more than all else to make 
South Americans suspicious of us. 


CHAPTER LV 

THE UNITED STATES AND THE GREAT WAR 

784. Brief View of the Great War to the Time of our 
Entrance.—In August of 1914 war began, involving all the 
great powers of Europe. We cannot discuss its causes, 
but the world became convinced in due time that the chief 
cause was the growth in Germany of an aggressive war 
spirit which in its high officials took the form of a desire to 
gain world power and to dictate to the rest of the world 
its political conduct. Germany began the attack with an 
invasion of Belgium, a neutral country, which Germany 
was bound by treaty to protect. It was the path of least 
resistance for invading France. The German armies, de¬ 
layed somewhat by Belgium’s resistance, swept toward 
Paris and were only halted at the last moment in the immor¬ 
tal battle of the Marne. Slow moving Russia attacked 
Germany and Austria meanwhile on the east. There the 
line swayed back and forth for three years as mighty armies 
won or lost. After the battle of the Marne, the Germans 
retreated some distance and then dug in, as did the French 
and the English, who came to their aid. There the French 



RECENT POLITICAL HISTORY 


463 


held while England with but a small army at first, began and 
carried through the creation of a vast army equal to the 
task of defeating Germany. After some months, Italy 
entered on the side of the Allies. Turkey joined Germany 
and Austria, and when the last two powers undertook to 
crush Serbia, they were aided by Bulgaria. Roumania 
came in on the side of the 
Allies, but deserted by 
Russia, she was soon crush¬ 
ed. Germany and Austria 
in their central position had 
a great advantage which 
long made them seem the 
probable victors, but with 
all their victories they could 
not shake off the grip of the 
British fleet whose control of 
the sea strangled German 
commerce and proved the 
final salvation of the Allies. 

785. Our Way of Looking 
at Europe.—Though the fear 
and. expectation of such a 
struggle had long possessed 
intelligent Europeans, the 
average American was shock¬ 
ed and dazed by the outbreak of war in August of 1914. 
Americans had been so absorbed by home affairs that they 
had paid little heed to events beyond the seas. When war 
began, the average American citizen thought impatiently, 
“There goes that turbulent John Bull and that excitable 
Frenchman and that stupid ‘Dutchman’ shooting up the 
world again.’’ They had no deep sympathy for any of them. 
Educated men had a certain fondness for spiritual, intel¬ 
lectual France. They thought gratefully of her aid in the 
American Revolution, but many had a foolish idea that she 



Field Marshal Joseph Joffre, 
who Checked the German 
Advance at the First Battle 
of the Marne. 








464 THE UNITED STATES AND THE GREAT WAR 

was weakening, going down hill, and not to be taken se¬ 
riously in the world’s fierce struggle for power. Of the British 
Empire men thought less kindly. Lawyers and students 
of history realized our deep obligation to her for the founda¬ 
tion of our legal system and for principles of free govern¬ 
ment, but most men harbored bitter memories of the Revo¬ 
lution and the War of 1812. Politicians liked to “twist 
the lion’s tail,” as attacking Great Britain was called, to 
get the favor of certain racial factions. In fact, if England 
had seemed in the least to blame for beginning the war, 
American opinion would have turned against her. Germany 
had for years held a favorable place in American opinion. 
Thousands of Germans had migrated here, and made 
excellent citizens. It had been the fashion for scientific 
men and scholars to study in Germany. German music and 
musicians were admired. Germany was well advertised 
and America thought well of her. In a word, America’s 
sympathy would go to those belligerents whose conduct 
was most in keeping with American ideals. 

786. Official Neutrality but Growing Popular Dislike of 
Germany.—Early in August, 1914, the news came that 
Austria had declared war on Serbia, that Germany had 
declared war on Russia and France, that she had invaded 
Belgium, and that for this violation of international agree¬ 
ment, England had declared war on Germany. All the 
world seemed in flames and the American government did 
as Washington did in 1793, declared its neutrality. Presi¬ 
dent Wilson asked men to be impartial even in thought, 
not to sit in judgment on others. But no official orders 
could paralyze the moral judgment of a free people. The 
conviction grew daily that Germany had deliberately 
brought on the war. Men saw her armies invade a small 
neutral country and wage a war, the guiding principle of 
which was “frightfulness.” They saw her destroy whole 
towns and the people in them because some one or two 
persons in them had been accused of firing on German 



Western and Eastern Battle Front! 































































466 THE UNITED STATES AND THE GREAT WAR 


soldiers. Soon there were German raids on defenseless 
towns on the English coast; Zeppelins hovered over London 
and dropped bombs that killed innocent women and chil¬ 
dren. The occupied portions of Belgium and Northern 
France were pillaged and devastated; able-bodied men, 
boys and young women were ruthlessly deported to Germany 
for servitude worse than slavery. No regard was paid to 



Submarine Ruthlessness. 

A Neutral Sailing Vessel Torpedoed without Warning. 


the regulations which had controlled civilized warfare for 
centuries. Slowly the minds of Americans were turned 
against Germany, even before the American people them¬ 
selves suffered injury, still there was no general thought 
that we should enter the war. Indeed, the ruling idea was 
that we should keep out. 

787. The Blockade and the Submarine Menace.—As the 

European struggle increased in fury, American rights be¬ 
came involved through the conflicts on the sea. England 
had no great army, as had Germany, France, and Russia, 
and while she prepared one she depended almost wholly on 










RECENT POLITICAL HISTORY 


467 


her powerful navy. This great fleet not only protected her 
from invasion, but cut off all communication by the German 
merchant ships with the outside world. Germany needed 
raw materials like cotton, copper, rubber, and some food 
stuffs not raised in her dominions or those of her allies. 
This choking off of her trade made her desperate, and after 
her few raiding ships were chased from the high seas, she 
began to try bringing Great Britain to terms by using 
submarines to sink merchant vessels bringing food and 
munitions to England. An ancient rule of the sea required 
that merchant vessels be visited and searched before being 
seized as war prizes, and that they could be sunk only 
in case it was impossible to take them into a prize port 
and then only after the crew and passengers had been 
placed in safety. This the frail and incommodious sub¬ 
marine could not do, and therefore, in all reason, the 
under-sea boat was barred by international law from such 
activity. Our government warned Germany that we 
would hold her to “strict accountability” if any American 
vessel was thus destroyed or if our citizens thus lost their 
lives. Germany replied that she was driven to this by 
England’s illegal methods of preventing commerce between 
Germany and the neutral countries. 1 The answer was, of 
course, that if Great Britain broke the rules of the sea, or 
violently extended them, that she did not take human life, 
and that any property damage might be paid for while 
human life could not. 

788. The “Lusitania” Outrage.—There were several 
minor offenses by U-boats and then suddenly (May 7, 1915) 
the whole world was shocked and horrified to learn that a 
German submarine had sunk without warning the giant 

1 She meant by this that England blockaded at a distance, and seized 
vessels bound even to Holland and Denmark, if they carried goods 
meant simply to pass through those neutral countries into Germany. 
But in the Civil War, we, too, had seized goods bound for Mexico or the 
West Indies if the final destination was the Confederacy. 



468 the united states and the great war 

steamship, the Lusitania. Of the 1,154 lives lost, 114 were 
Americans—many being women and children. At first 
men could hardly believe that any government could order 
such a dastardly crime to be committed, or that, having 
been ordered, any human being could be so ruthless as to 
obey the command. Many who had refused before to be¬ 
lieve the brutality of Prussian militarism now saw a great 
light. Germany was j ubilant and seemed wholly to approve 
this exploit. So cold-blooded had been the plan and the 
deed that the German embassy had actually warned the 
passengers in the daily papers. The warning was an insult. 
American citizens had the indisputable right, our govern¬ 
ment said in its note of protest, to take their ships and 
travel wherever their business called them, confident that 
their lives would not be endangered. The German govern¬ 
ment, having brought a perjured witness, claimed that the 
Lusitania was armed and carried munitions. President 
Wilson denied this and declared that, anyway, the princi¬ 
pal fact was that “men, women and children were sent to 
their death in circumstances unparalleled in modern war¬ 
fare.” He said that in demanding that Germany disavow 
this act and in declaring that a repetition would be regarded 
as “deliberately unfriendly” he was “contending for nothing 
less high and sacred than the rights of humanity.” Ger¬ 
many promised to meet our demands as to passenger ships. 
Though ships continued to be sunk and American lives to 
be lost, the administration, in its strong desire to keep out 
of the war, found some circumstance each time which 
permitted it to delay severing relations with Germany. 
Among the American people feeling against Germany rose 
with every new offense. 

789. German Preparedness for World Dominion.—When 
thoughtful men considered the possibility of war with 
Germany, a query that made them pause was, “What will 
be the conduct in that event of the hundreds of thousands 
of German-Americans in the United States?” The German 


RECENT POLITICAL HISTORY 


469 


government had been far-reaching in its preparation to 
gain world dominion. It had not only stored up unheard-of 
amounts of ammunition and created great guns of unprece¬ 
dented caliber, but it had sought to paralyze all opposition 
in countries that might sympathize with its enemies. There 
were many devices, but the chief was the effort to keep loyal 
to Germany the hundreds of thousands of German emi¬ 
grants who had gone to foreign lands, especially America. 
They were impressed with the idea that they had a mission 
to Germanize the land to which they came. An Alliance to 
preserve German culture in foreign lands was formed. 
Journalists and clergymen in America were induced to foster 
the use of the German language. They were urged to make 
every effort to destroy Anglo-Saxon unity, to keep England 
aloof from America, to fight Puritanism with its reforms, 
such as the Prohibition movement which “interfered with 
personal liberty.” Great associations were formed in Amer¬ 
ica to keep Germans from becoming too American and 
mixing with the other races. They sought to have the Ger¬ 
man language and German “Kultur” taught in the schools. 
There was a mixture of good and bad in these aims, but 
the danger was the destruction of American unity and 
loyalty to American ideals. This work, some of it done by 
master spies who distributed medals and iron crosses to 
the faithful German editors and clergy, had in this day of 
national danger created a great rift in American society 
which seemed to threaten the stability of the Union. For¬ 
tunately, in spite of every German intrigue, the majority 
of German-Americans “would not permit the blood in their 
veins to drown the conscience in their breasts.” 

790. German Intrigue and Crime within our Borders.— 
Besides the submarine outrages, Germany gave great 
offense by intrigue, the heart of which was in Berlin, as 
President Wilson said, and which “corrupted the very 
thought and spirit of our people.” German secret agents 
were everywhere. They tried to make American territory 


470 THE UNITED STATES AND THE GREAT WAR 


a base of German military operations, seeking to destroy 
Canadian canal locks, railroads, and factories. Von Bern- 
storff, the German ambassador, tried from our territory to 
stir up revolt in India and to give illegal military aid to 

Germany. His agents 
bought up American 
writers, lecturers and 
newspapers. They tried 
to stir up feeling against 
us in Mexico. Because 
the British fleet con¬ 
trolled the ocean paths 
of commerce, the Allies 
could obtain guns, mu¬ 
nitions, food, and cloth¬ 
ing of us, while Ger¬ 
many could not. As 
neutrals we had the right 
to sell, and we would 
have sold to both bellig- 

The Modern Serpent in the Garden. eren f s but Germany 
From the Eagle (Brooklyn) could not bring home 

what she might buy. In 
her mad rage at this state of affairs, she chose to ignore all 
international law. Her agents made bombs on the very 
German ships interned for safety in our harbors. They 
placed these bombs on ships to destroy them at sea, in 
factories to blow them up. They incited strikes and sabo¬ 
tage. 1 They burned raw materials. These monstrous crimes 
caused the death of many Americans. To commit these 
outrages Germany spent millions of dollars, and caused the 
destruction of millions of dollars’ worth of property. Ger¬ 
many did all this while pretending to be our friend. The 
patience of our government only made her venture further 
in her dark and secret plots. 



1 Destruction of machines and tools. 











RECENT POLITICAL HISTORY 


471 


791. Preparedness Campaign and Opposition.—As the 

danger that America would be drawn into the war increased, 
a strong movement began in the country to get us prepared 
for war. A big navy and universal military service were 
the chief demands. General Leonard Wood was the ac¬ 
knowledged leader in the movement for military prepared¬ 
ness. The serious mistake which England was said to have 
made in failing to have universal service was one of the strong 
arguments. Her blunders and confusion in the early months 
of the war were pointed out as a terrible example to us. 
If Germany should win in Europe, it was urged, she would 
attack us next. She hated our Monroe Doctrine, she envied 
our prosperity, she would wage war on us if ever she could 
gain control of the British and French fleets. Some went 
so far as to declare that we ought to be in the war, that the 
very existence of democracy was at stake, that in our delay 
we were recreant to the great cause. Against this policy 
worked certain men more idealistic than practical. They 
urged “peace at any price” and declared that “all wars 
were caused by preparedness.” The talk of “honor” and 
“the flag,” they declared, was nonsense. The sacredness 
of human life was more important than mere honor. Many 
thoughtful men worked against preparedness, but they 
offered nobler arguments. They feared the growth of the 
spirit of militarism which Prussia had made so hateful to 
the world. If we could remain neutral we might hold ourselves 
ready “to play a part of impartial mediation and speak coun¬ 
sels of peace . . . not as a partisan but as a friend.” If we 
armed, we would menace, not conciliate. 

792. The Presidential Campaign of 1916.—In the midst of 
this great controversy the presidential campaign of 1916 
began. The rival candidates were President Wilson, re¬ 
nominated by his party, and Charles E. Hughes, taken from 
the Supreme Court bench to lead the Republicans. The 
chief claim for the Democratic candidate was the record of 
reforms in finance, tariff, and labor legislation, which his 


472 THE UNITED STATES AND THE GREAT WAR 


administration had pressed through Congress. In the 
South and West the cry “He kept us out of war” had much 
influence. The Republican party might have taken the 
stand that President Wilson’s foreign policy had been a 
mistake. It might have set out to rouse the moral sense of 
the nation as to its duty to aid the world’s democracies in 
their struggle with German autocracy. Instead, its conserv¬ 
ative leaders made an effort to substitute poor, little, fretful 
Mexico for big, dangerous Germany as the great problem 
in our foreign affairs. President Wilson by his sharp notes 
against the German government had made enemies among 
such German-Americans as loved Germany more than the 
United States. Mr. Hughes’ enemies said that he hoped 
to get that vote, when he talked gently about Germany and 
her American friends. Against this policy worked Theodore 
Roosevelt, whom the Progressives in the Republican party 
had desired as candidate. He had refused to run again as 
an opposition candidate, and had come out in support of 
Hughes, but he insisted on talking plainly about the real 
issues, true Americanism and resistance to German outrage. 
Many had objected to President Wilson that he had 
handled Germany too tenderly, but when Mr. Hughes 
refused to promise sterner action and to array the “hy¬ 
phens” against him, such people turned to President 
Wilson. He was re-elected by solid South and almost solid 
West, losing mainly in the North Central and Eastern states. 

793. The Growing Peril of German Victory. —Though the 
politicians fought shy of the real issue, the country was 
slowly coming to face the question, “What if the Kaiser 
wins?” His treasury overflowing with loot and war in¬ 
demnities, France bled white and held in the military grasp 
as Belgium was then held, England’s fleet in Germany’s 
hands and that little island helpless as Holland was, the 
Kaiser in shining arm'or at the head of troops drunk with 
victory—what other worlds would be left to conquer? 
America, of course! America, the last bulwark of democ- 



■SOUTH 

Dakota 


'WISCONSIN, 


IOWA 

13 


ItliNOiS 1 

fc, 29 


■I DEMOCRATIC 
I I REPUBLICAN 

11111 DEMOCRATIC 

BuSESI WITHOUT REAL CONTEST 


RECENT POLITICAL HISTORY 473 

racy, left to fight alone! Greater and greater numbers of 
people were coming to feel America’s kinship with the civili¬ 
zation of France and England. More and more the danger 
grew that Germany, with the enormous advantage which 
her central position and her complete readiness had given 
her, would win the war. While merely holding the line in 
France against her most powerful enemies, Germany was 


This Map Shows Each State’s Electoral Vote and the States 
Carried by Wilson and Hughes Respectively in 1916 


able to turn against her weaker foes, one after another. She 
crushed first Servia, then Roumania. Against Russia, weak¬ 
ened by treason within and by economic inadequacy, Ger¬ 
many dealt blow after blow which threatened her complete 
overthrow. It began to be plain that the hope of democracy 
lay in the United States. Would she come to the rescue? 








474 THE UNITED STATES AND THE GREAT WAR 


794. The Final Insult and a Declaration of War.— 

This was America’s position when, in January, 1917, Ger¬ 
many, having deceived us for months with false promises and 
cynical apologies, suddenly came into the open with the 
brazen announcement that after February 1 she would sink 
all ships found within a certain described zone about 
England, France and Italy. In vain did our government 
protest and on February 3 the German ambassador was 
sent home. In the effort still to stave off actual war the 
administration recommended a policy of armed neutrality. 
A small group of willful men in the Senate prevented such 
action by Congress. Then a note sent by the German foreign 
secretary, Zimmermann, to the German minister in Mexico 
fell into our government’s hands. It sought to induce 
Mexico and Japan to attack the United States if we entered 
the war against Germany. That and renewed sinkings by 
submarines were too much and on April 2, 1917, President 
Wilson appeared before Congress and asked for a recognition 
of a state of war with Germany. “The challenge,” he 
said, “was to all mankind. The wrongs against which we 
now array ourselves are no common wrongs; they cut to 
the very roots of human life. The world,” he demanded, 
“must be made safe for democracy. We have no selfish 
ends to ser've. We are but one of the champions of the 
rights of mankind.” Congress and the whole countrv 
responded to this ringing appeal. On April 6, 1917, Congress 
passed a joint resolution declaring that a state of war existed 
between the Imperial German Government and the Govern¬ 
ment and people of the United States and making provision 
for prosecuting the same. On the same day President 
Wilson issued his proclamation of a state of war and in it 
made an earnest appeal “to all American citizens that they, 
in loyal devotion to their country, dedicated from its foun¬ 
dation to the principles of liberty and justice, uphold the laws 
of the land and give undivided and willing support to those 
measures which may be adopted by the constitutional 


THE UNITED STATES AND THE GREAT WAR 475 


authorities in prosecuting the war to a successful issue and 
in obtaining a secure and just peace.” War was not declared 
on the Government of Austria-Hungary until December. 

795. America’s Big Task.—To declare war is one thing; 
to carry it on with vigor is another. Could America, unused 
to armed conflict, unaccustomed to handling vast armies 
and immense navies, a country that had grown great and 
strong in peaceful industry, bring its strength to bear 
promptly and effectively? Would the people rise in their 
might? Could big armies be raised and provided with arms, 
food and clothing? Could millions of men, if once they were 
made into an army, be carried across the sea, infested as it 
was with lurking submarines? No country ever faced a 
bigger task. But though some few hesitated and doubted, 
the people as a whole took up their burdens willingly and 
entered upon their tasks with enthusiasm. We had at the 
outset only a small army, about two hundred thousand men, 
and nearly one-third of these national guardsmen recently 
called into federal service. The navy, too, though far from 
weak, needed many additional men. 

796. Making an Army.—One of the first things to be 
done was to secure additional officers to organize and train 
the millions of raw recruits into fighting armies. Officers’ 
training camps were established and were soon filled with 
young men carefully selected for rigorous training. The 
first camp opened in May, 1917, and at the end of three 
months thousands had received their commissions as officers 
in the United States Army. Though many men volunteered 
for service both in the army and the navy, there was a general 
belief that the fairest and most reasonable method was to 
adopt a system of conscription. In May, therefore, the 
Selective Conscription Act 1 —commonly called the Draft 

1 Under this act 24,234,021 men were registered and more than 
2,000,093 were taken into military service. The act at first provided 
only for summoning the younger men and these younger men formed 
the great majority of the army as it was finally organized. 





476 THE UNITED STATES AND THE GREAT WAR 


Act—was passed, and under this act, as amended, all men 
from 18 to 45 years of age were registered. 

From this number soldiers were chosen and sent to the 
army cantonments which were hastily built in various parts 
of the country. The first quota of the national army began 
to gather in the cantonments in September, 1917. 2 

Before the war was over, the armed forces of the army 
and navy numbered 4,800,000 men. But there was more to 
be done than merely to get men together: clothing, blankets, 

and food had to be provid¬ 
ed; arms and ammunition 
had to be made and distrib¬ 
uted; ships had to be built 
to replace those that were 
sunk by submarines and 
to carry food to Europe; 
aeroplanes had to be made 
and men trained for flying. 
It is a long storjq when all 
is told, a story of a great 
and brave undertaking, 
a story of failings and 
blunders, largely due to the 
eager haste and the novelty 
of the task, a story of dis¬ 
appointment and of accomplishment, a story, also, tremendous¬ 
ly interesting because of the immensity of the task undertaken. 

2 Even the building of the cantonments was an immense task, a task 
made more difficult by the fact that all had to be done quickly. “To 
build factories and storage warehouses for supplies as well as housing 
for troops, 200,000 workmen in the United States were kept continuously 
occupied for the period of the war. The force of workers on this 
single activity was larger than the total strength of both the southern 
and the northern armies in the battle of Gettysburg. . . . The 

total expenditures in this enterprise to November 11 , 1918, were, in 
round numbers, 8800,000,000, or about twice the cost of the Panama 
Canal .”—The War with Germany, an official report by Col. L. P. Ayres 
of the General Staff. 







THE UNITED STATES AND THE GREAT WAR 477 

797. The People Willingly Accept the Burdens of War. 

—Ships of war were early sent across the sea to help in 
battling the submarines and General Pershing with his staff 
and a few troops were sent over as early as June, 1917; but 
on the whole the first year of our entering the war was 


Women Workers in a Munitions Factory 
Note the size of the projectiles. 

largely taken up with preparations. Nearly every one was 
doing something to help win the war. The loyal women of 
the country did their full share of every kind of war work. 
The Red Cross service, greatly enlarged, entered on its work 
of mercy; the Young Men’s Christian Association, the 
Knights of Columbus, the Salvation Army, the War Camp 
Community Service, and other organizations raised huge 
funds and sent out their members to comfort and cheer the 
soldiers in the cantonments and at the front. New duties and 











478 THE UNITED STATES AND THE GREAT WAR 



unexpected privations were endured good-naturedly, for 
no one felt just right unless he was doing something or 
making some sacrifice in the common cause. One very 
important thing was to save food and so, under government 
regulation and request, various food restrictions were 


The Transport Mauretania 

The sister ship of the Lusitania carrying our troops overseas. 

accepted. Some of us found out for the first time how much 
we depended on white bread and plenty of sugar. 

798. The Anxious Spring Months of 1918.—In the 
Spring of 1918, American troops began to be hurried across 
the ocean in large numbers. 1 It was high time. Germany 


1 In April, 118,000; in May, 245,000; in June, 278,000; in July. 
306,000. In the last six months of the war, 1,500,000 were carried 
across. 






THE UNITED STATES AND THE GREAT WAR 479 


and Austria, though suffering heavily, were by no means 
beaten. Russia, in which there had been a revolution over¬ 
throwing the Czar, had practically gone to pieces and her 
Bolshevist leaders had entered into a shameful peace with 
Germany. Italy, striving heroically, was in real difficulty. 
Britain and France were fighting hard and had no intention of 
giving up but they were putting forth all their efforts. In 
March the Germans, eager to win in France before American 
troops could land in force, began a series of heavy blows 
on the western front seeking to divide the British and French 
armies; to smash their way through to the channel ports 
and to take Paris. They did not succeed in their main 
purpose but by June the Allied Armies had been pushed back 
in battle after battle—battles of horror and of untellable 
losses and suffering. Small bodies of American troops had 
already done valiant service but by the early summer with 
steadify increasing numbers they were ready to throw them¬ 
selves, full of spirit and determination, into the strife. The 
Americans, who were commanded by General Pershing, 
and the other Allied forces were placed under General 
Foch and thus the Allies in the emergency had for the first 
time the advantage of an undivided command. Foch found 
that the new soldiers from the Western Republic could fight 
like veterans. A body of American troops fought with 
great bravery at Chateau-Thierry and by their magnificent 
courage put new heart into the war-worn French and British 
troops. 

799. The Tide Turns. American Soldiers Fight 
Bravely.—The turning point, the beginning of the end of the 
war, came in July. The Germans were dangerously near 
Paris; another successful attack would take them almost 
to the gates of the city; but the attack failed. American 
troops ably and bravely helped in blocking the way. Foch, 
knowing he had a fresh, eager army to help him, decided 
to take the offensive. Furious attacks were launched against 
the enemy. Little by little, step by step, the enemy was 



Field Marshal 
Sir Douglas Haig 
Commanding the 
English Armies 

(below) 


General 

John J. Pershing 
Commander-in-Chief 
American Expedi¬ 
tionary Forces 

(right) 


Field Marshal 
Ferdinand Foch 
Commander-in-Chiei 
of all the Allied 
Armies. 

{left) 


General 
Armando Diaz 
Commanding the 
Italian Armies 

(above) 
















THE UNITED STATES AND THE GREAT WAR 481 

driven back from the devastated fields and ruined villages of 
France. In September the American army drove the 
German line back at St. Mihiel. At the end of that month 
our troops began an attack in force on the Meuse-Argonne 
front, the purpose being, as General Pershing said, “to draw 
the best German divisions to our front and to consume them.” 
For six long weeks the battle went on. With undying 
heroism and doing almost impossible feats, though with 
frightful losses, Pershing’s splendid army pushed ahead, 
winning its way by sheer courage and unfailing energy. 
The Meuse-Argonne battle was the greatest battle ever 
fought by American troops and one of the greatest and 
most terrible battles of the world’s history. All honor to our 
boys who gave up their lives there for the cause of democracy 
and of justice among nations! 1 

800. Victory at Last.—The enemy, unable to stand longer 
and realizing the hopelessness of the struggle, asked for an 
armistice and on November 11 the terms as laid down by 
the Allies were accepted. Active warfare then ceased. The 
Germans marched back to their own country and American 
and Allied armies moved on to the Rhine. The greatest 
and most destructive war in history ended in the defeat of 
Germany, the flight of the Kaiser into Holland and the 
overthrow of the Austrian emperor. America had her 


1 “In some ways the Meuse-Argonne offers an interesting resemblance 
to the battle of the Wilderness, fought from May 5 to May 12, 1864, in 
the Civil War. Both were fought over a terrain covered with tangled 
woods and underbrush. The Wilderness was regarded as a long battle, 
marked by slow progress against obstinate resistance with very heavy 
casualties. Here the similarity ends. The Meuse-Argonne lasted 
six times as long as the battle of the Wilderness. Twelve times as 
many troops were engaged as were on the Union side. They used in 
action ten times as many guns and fired about one hundred times 
as many rounds of ammunition. The actual weight of the ammunition 
fired was greater than that used by the Union forces during the entire 
Civil War.” Ayres, as above, p. 112. 



482 THE UNITED STATES AND THE GREAT WAR 


splendid share in victory but we must not forget that the 
most grievous burden was borne by Britain, France, Italy 
and Britain’s loyal colonies. 

801. The Cost of the War.—The cost of the war in 

human lives we shall never know exactly but the battle 
deaths alone amounted to at least 7,500,000. The armies 
of the United States lost by battle and disease 112,422 men. 
The cost in money to all the nations at war was so large that 
the figures are staggering—something like $186,000,000,000. 
For a period of twenty-five months (April, 1917—April, 1919) 
the United States alone spent more than $1,000,000 an hour. 1 

What is to come from all this vast expenditure of money, 
all this splendid heroism, all this terrible suffering, all this 
sorrow, all this giving up of bright young lives at the call of 
duty? We have faith to believe that all has not been done 
in vain; that henceforth men, the world over, will seek 
more earnestly than ever before to follow the line of duty 
and to treat their neighbors with respect. German military 
might and arrogance have been broken down. We must try 
to make certain and secure those principles of right to defend 
which America rose to arms. 

802. The Peace Conference.—In January, 1919, a peace 
conference met in Paris to draw up the terms that Germany 
and Austria must accept. The leader of the delegation from 
Great Britain was Lloyd George, the prime minister; of 
France, Premier Georges Clemenceau; of Italy, Premier 
Vittorio Orlando. President Wilson was at the head of the 
American delegation; 2 he believed that it was his “paramount 
duty” to attend and to do directly all that he might to 


1 “Our expenditure in this war was sufficient to carry on the Revolu¬ 
tionary War continuously for more than a thousand years at the rate 
of expenditure that that war actually involved.” Ayres, as above, 
p. 131. 

2 He sailed for France in December, 1918, and except for a short 
interval, was absent over six months. 




THE UNITED STATES AND THE GREAT WAR 483 

secure in the peace terms an assurance of the lofty purposes 
and ideals for which America had been fighting and which, 
we believed, our Allies cherished. The main and compelling 
ideals of the war had been put forth by President Wilson 
in a number of speeches and messages; after we entered the 
conflict he had been the main spokesman of the Allies to the 
world. 1 He had much at heart the formation of a League 
of Nations for the preservation of peace, an idea which had 
been presented in many ways and at various times both in 
this country and in Europe; indeed, in the President’s war 
message to Congress, April 2, 1917, he had announced “a 
universal dominion of right by such a concert of free peoples 
as shall bring peace and safety to all nations and make the 
world itself free” as one of the things for which we should 
fight. Though the conference began work on the treaty in 
January, it was not submitted to the German delegates until 
May 7, the anniversary of the sinking of the Lusitania. 
After that time some weeks passed, partly consumed in 
answering German complaints, before the document was 
put into its finished form and signed by the German delegates, 
June 28. President Wilson returned to the United States 
early in July and laid the treaty before the Senate for its 
ratification. 

803. The Treaty.—The treaty is too long and elaborate 
to be described here in more than barest outline. It provides 
that Alsace-Lorraine, taken from France in 1871, shall be 
restored to her; that Germany shall pay for the losses of the 


1 In the course of the war he had announced what were called the 
Fourteen Points—a program of peace. The program had a good 
deal to say about the reordering of Europe, in order that oppressed 
peoples might have freedom—self-determination. We had been drawn 
into a war brought on in part by the fact that injustice had been done 
in Europe in the past, where territories had been seized and people 
had been annexed against their will. We had the right to demand that 
these old injustices should be in some measure done away with, and a 
new map of Europe arranged on the basis of justice, if possible. 



484 THE UNITED STATES AND THE GREAT WAR 


war by the Allies and for the wanton destruction of mines, 
factories and private property; that the German army and 
navy must be greatly reduced and compulsory military 
service abolished; that Poland and Czecho-Slovakia be es¬ 
tablished as independent nations; that the former German 
colonies, lost during the war, be withheld from her and placed 
chiefly in charge of the League of Nations; that the German 
Kaiser be demanded for trial on the charge of “a supreme 
offense against international morality and the sanctity of 
treaties.” The treaty also calls for a League of Nations, 
to be composed of nearly all the nations of the world, but 
not including, for the time being, those nations against 
which the Allies waged war. The main purpose of the 
League is to prevent war; it aims to secure the settlement of 
disputes through discussion and peaceful adjudication; it 
proposes by the reduction of armaments to cut down the 
burden of “armed peace.” We all have the right to hope 
and demand that some way be found to settle differences 
among nations without resort to war with its inevitable 
destruction of life and property. We entered the conflict 
with the calm determination to overthrow the dangerous 
military system of Germany and to secure for ourselves, 
and if possible for others, the establishment of a better 
world to live in based on a higher sense of justice and right. 


THE CONSTITUTION AND GOVERNMENT 485 


CHAPTER LVI 

THE CONSTITUTION AND GOVERNMENT OF THE 

UNITED STATES 

804. Constitution Grants Powers.—In any view of our 
national government we must remember that it has certain 
powers granted to it by the Constitution (see pages 220,221). 
Other powers are left to the states or to the people. Congress 
has no right under the Constitution to do everything it may 
think best, but only to pass laws on the subjects over which 
it is given authority. So in this country the powers of gov¬ 
ernment are distributed between the states and the central 
government; that is the big fact to be remembered. We 
see that our system here in America is quite different from 
that of a state like France, where the central government 
at Paris can pass laws on all subjects-. We call France a 
unitary state; but the United States we call a federal state. 

805. Powers Granted are General Rather than Local.— 
The Constitution grants to the government at Washington 
the right to take charge of such matters as can best be man¬ 
aged by one general government. For example, it would 
not do to leave such things as making war, or carrying it on, 
or entering into treaties, or managing commerce on the high 
seas , or, indeed , coining money, to the various states. 
On the other hand, it seems wise to leave local affairs to be 
managed by the states themselves; they therefore have the 
right to establish schools, to regulate local business, to 
keep order and punish for crimes, to do, in fact, the thousand 
and one things which need to be done by law for ordering 
the everyday life of people in their relation with one another. 

806. Two Governments.—The consequence of having this 
system is that each of us lives under two governments— 
the national government and the state government. Each 
of these governments has a right to pass laws of a certain kind 


486 


CONSTITUTION AND GOVERNMENT 


and not to pass others. The situation is perhaps easily seen 
from the following figure: 

The Government of The Government of 

the United States the State of New York 

\ _ / ' 

The People of New York State 

Thus, every person has, so to speak, two masters, or per¬ 
haps we should say two servants, for, though we must obey 
the laws passed by government, in this country every gov¬ 
ernment is thought to be and intended to be for the common 
good and subject to the will of the people. 

807. Three Governments.—Some of you will say that the 
figure above is not quite exact; for surely you live also under 
a city government. That is quite true; but the city govern¬ 
ment is provided for by the state government and it can be 
changed by the state government. The city obtains its 
charter, which we might call its constitution, from the state; 
and so we may justly look upon the city as the agent of the 
state. Its right and power of self-government are granted 
by the state. 

808. Many Officers.—If we should go on now and de¬ 
scribe the whole system, we should see that it is very compli¬ 
cated; and we sometimes wonder that we have been so suc¬ 
cessful in managing governmental machinery which appears 
to offer so many puzzling problems. We can take some 
comfort, if it all seems so troublesome, in remembering that 
we have courts and officers learned in the law, whose business 
it is to keep the lines from getting tangled and to help 
manage the whole machinery. Moreover, although the gov¬ 
ernment at Washington has very important things to do, you 
and I do not come into very close touch with national officers 
as a rule. While we need to know what is done at Washing 
ton, because what is done there often affects the welfare o\ 
the whole people very deeply, we ought not to suppose that 








OF THE UNITED STATES 


487 


the city and the state are not of much consequence. Even 
in these days, when the national government is doing many 
things which it did not need to do in the older, simpler life 
of the nation, you and I might pass our whole lives without 
ever seeing any national officer except a postman delivering 
the mail. 

809. Makeup of the Constitution.—If you will look at 
the Constitution of the United States, you will see that it is 
made up of seven main articles, and there are also seventeen 
amendments. After the preamble, which states the purposes 
of establishing the Constitution, come: 

Article I, dealing with the legislative department. Here 
we find provisions for a Congress of two houses, whose duty 
it is to make the laws. Here also the subjects are given 
concerning which Congress can legislate, or, as we commonly 
say, here are listed the powers of Congress and also some 
things which Congress must not do. 1 

Article II provides for a President and Vice-President, and 
describes the duties of those officers. The President is the 
executive; that is to say, it is his duty to see that laws are 
enforced. 

Article III provides for the establishment of courts, and 
makes a statement of the kinds of cases which may be brought 
up for decision in the national courts. 

In Article IV we find certain rules which have to do chiefly 
with relations between the states of the Union. 

Article V declares how the Constitution may be amended. 

Article VI, though short, is a very important one, because 
it declares, among other things, that the Constitution, laws 
of the United States, and treaties are to be “the supreme law 
of the land.” This means, of course, that any law of a state 
or of a city, which is contrary to the United States Constitu¬ 
tion, laws, or treaties, cannot be considered as law. 2 

1 See the Constitution, Art. I, Sec. 9. 

2 This matter has caused much discussion and debate, and many 
learned words have been written about it; but though difficulties some- 



488 


CONSTITUTION AND GOVERNMENT 


Article VII is not now of importance except historically; 
it declares the way in which the Constitution was to be 
ratified and established when it was turned over to the 
states in 1787. 1 

810. Separation of the Powers.—We have seen that the 
states have a large body of powers and the national govern¬ 
ment also; we have said that powers were thus “distributed” 
among governments. The sketch of the Constitution given 
above also shows what is called the principle of the separa¬ 
tion of powers; legislative powers are granted to Congress, 
executive powers to the President, and judicial powers to 
the courts. Our state constitutions try to carry out the same 
principle. It is believed that in this way liberty and the 
rights of the people are better protected than they would be 
otherwise. We do not think, for example, that a big law¬ 
making body should decide suits between individuals or try 
to enforce the laws, or that a president or governor should 
make laws or do things for which courts are established. 

It is, of course, hard at times to decide whether a par¬ 
ticular duty belongs to the legislative, the executive, or the 
judicial branch; but again it may be said this principle of 
separation is not in itself very hard to understand. It is not 
much more difficult to understand than that one teacher in 


times arise in practice, surely girls and boys in school can understand 
the main thing, the main principle. If the Constitution of the United 
States is, as it says, the law of the land, then, of course, anything con¬ 
trary to it would not and could not be law. Therefore if a law passed by 
a state legislature is to be considered “good law,” i.e., a law we must 
obey, it must not be contrary to the supreme law of the land. If the 
teachers in your school have a right to make rules about the use of your 
playground or the gymnasium, and if they do make a rule, any rule 
made by a club of the schoolboys and directly violating the teacher’s 
rule cannot be held to be anything but a mark of disobedience; it is 
not a rule at all, only an attempt to make a rule. A court will declare 
any law contrary to the supreme law of the land to be no law at all, or 
null and void. 

1 See pages 221, 222. 



OF THE UNITED STATES 


489 

a school teaches mathematics, another reading, and a third 
history. 

The principle is not, however, carried out completely; for 
example, the President must sign bills before they become 
laws, unless after his refusal two-thirds of both houses pass 
the bill again; 1 he has, therefore, part of the lawmaking 
power. 

811. House of Representatives.—Let us consider Con¬ 
gress and see something of its methods of work. The House 
of Representatives is made up of persons chosen by the 
people to serve for two years. The number chosen in each 
state depends on the population; one state, New York, 
chooses forty-three representatives; Nevada chooses but one. 
There are now altogether four hundred and thirty-five mem¬ 
bers. A state is divided into congressional districts, from 
each one of which one congressman is chosen by direct vote 
of the people. 

812. Senate.—Until the Seventeenth Amendment was 
adopted (1913)—in other words, for over a hundred years— 
members of the Senate were elected by the state legislatures. 
This method of choice was for some reasons objectionable, 
one reason being that sometimes party struggles in the state 
legislature were so intense that there was great difficulty in 
choosing a senator and, in consequence, state business was 
neglected at times for months together. Now senators are 
elected by the people of a state, each state being entitled to 
choose two. Arrangements are so made, however, that as a 
general rule only one senator is elected at a time. 2 (See the 

1 The President has what is called the veto power; i.e., he can refuse 
to sign a bill passed by Congress and then return it with his reasons to 
the house in which it originated. A like power is generally in the hands 
of the state governors when bills from state legislatures come before 
them. For the exact constitutional provision in the national system, 
see Constitution, Art. I, Sec. 7. 

2 The intention of the framers of the Constitution was to give the 
Senate some permanence, and so they provided for having only one- 
third of the senators go out of office or be re-elected at one time. It is 



490 


CONSTITUTION AND GOVERNMENT 


Constitution, Art. I, Sec. 3.) A senator’s term of office is 
six years. The Vice-President presides over the Senate, 
but has no vote except in case of a tie. 

813. Powers of the Two Houses.—Though we often speak 
of the House of Representatives as the “lower house” and 
the Senate as the “upper house,” in all ordinary lawmaking 
the two branches of Congress stand on the same level. 
Both branches must pass every bill before it becomes a law. 
There are, however, some differences in the powers of the 
two houses. 

1. Bills for raising revenue must originate, i.e., begin, in 
the House of Representatives, or as we commonly say in the 
“House.” A tariff bill, for example, which provides that 
certain sums must be paid to the government on articles 
brought into the country from foreign countries, must first 
be introduced in the House. After the House has passed 
such a bill it is sent to the Senate. 

2. On the other hand, the Senate has some duties which 
do not fall to the House at all. The advice and consent of 
the Senate are needed to establish any treaty which the 
President may have made with a foreign state. Like advice 
and consent are required in the case of appointments to 
office made by the President. * 1 Thus it will be seen that thje 
Senate is more than a lawmaking body; having a share in 
treaty making and in appointing to office, it is, while doing 
these duties, a sort of executive council. 

3. The two houses have different duties in impeachment 
proceedings. Impeachment is a means of bringing charges 

quite possible, though not likely, that at an election a House of Represen¬ 
tatives might be elected in which ever} 1, member would be a new mem¬ 
ber and quite without experience; that is not possible in case of the 
Senate. 

1 In the case of treaties, two-thirds of the Senate must agree. If the 
President sends in a treaty which has been drawn up with France, let 
us say, under his direction, two-thirds of the Senate must vote favorably 
or it will not be accepted. Only a bare majority is needed to confirm 
appointments to office. 



OF THE UNITED STATES 


491 


against an officer of the government and demanding his 
removal. 1 These charges are drawn up by the House; the 
trial is in the Senate, where, if the President is impeached, 
the chief justice of the supreme court presides. 2 The most 
famous use of this power in our history was the impeach¬ 
ment of President Johnson (1868), in which case only one 
vote in the Senate was lacking to make the two-thirds 
required to reach a verdict of guilty. 

814. How Congress Is Organized for Work. The Speaker. 
—The Constitution mentions a Speaker, who is the presiding 
officer of the House of Representatives. He is chosen by 
the members of the House. His position is a very important 
one, for he has great influence in directing the course of 
lawmaking. A number of persons whom we know as politi¬ 
cal leaders in our history have at one time or another been 
speakers—for instance, Henry Clay, James K. Polk, James 
G. Blaine, and Thomas B. Reed. 

815. Committees.—Both houses do much of their work 
through committees. In the House there are over fifty 
committees. When a bill is introduced into Congress, it is 
referred to a committee, and here, it is often said, the real 
work of Congress is carried on, for the committees are like so 
many little legislatures. Their methods of work are simple; 
they are not burdened by long troublesome rules; and, as 
the number of members is not large, business can be done 
easily. A committee studies petitions and other matters 
referred to it, makes up a bill as it thinks best, and reports 
to the house. The discussion then comes on the committee 
report and the bill thus presented, which the full house may 
then accept or reject. The most important committees of 
the House are Ways and Means, and Appropriations; the 
former prepares bills for raising money, the latter, bills 
making general appropriations of money to carry on the gov- 

1 See the Constitution, Art. II, Sec. 4, for the misdoings of officers 
which would justify their impeachment and removal. 

2 See Constitution, Art. I, Sec. 2, §5; Sec. 3, §§6, 7; Art. II, Sec. 4. 



492 


CONSTITUTION AND GOVERNMENT 


ernment. In the Senate, the leading committee is probably 
that on Foreign Relations. 

816. Bills.—When a bill has been passed by the vote of one 
house it is sent to the other. It may be amended and much 
changed in the second house, and, if so, must be sent back 
to see if the first house agrees to the changes. Often, at this 
stage, sharp disagreements arise, each house insisting on 
having the bill the way it wants it. When this happens the 
two houses appoint a conference committee, which generally 
manages to reach an agreement that is accepted by the 
houses themselves, and the bill is finally passed. When the 
bill is signed by the President it has become a law. 

817. The Courts.—The Constitution provides for one su¬ 
preme court and for such inferior courts as Congress may 
establish. The supreme court sits at Washington. This 
court has mainly the duty of deciding cases that are brought 
up from lower courts, either from state courts or lower Fed¬ 
eral courts; in other words, its main duty is to be what the 
lawyers call a court of appeals. 1 Many important cases 
arise, in which the court is called on to interpret the Consti¬ 
tution and laws, that is, to say what they mean. There are 
also district courts and circuit courts of appeals, which take 
charge of much of the judicial business of the United States. 2 

818. The President.—The President of the United States 
is one of the most powerful officials in the world. It is his 


1 See the Constitution, Art. III. 

2 There is no need of pupils’ trying now to learn from schoolbooks the 
exact court system of the United States: it is rather hard to understand 
and the details are not important. We can understand that the states 
have their courts, and the national government has its courts, and each 
has its special duty. In New York City, for example, there are state 
courts, and there is also a United States district court; a United States 
circuit court of appeals also sits in New York and reviews decisions of 
the district court. Appeals may also be taken to the supreme court at 
Washington. Until we have become lawyers or find that we have law 
suits on our hands, we do not need to know the details in order to be 
good citizens. 



OF THE UNITED STATES 


493 


duty to see that acts of Congress are carried out. He is also 
the commander in chief of the army and navy of the United 
States. His signature is necessary before a bill can become 
a law, unless, as we have seen before, it is passed over his 
veto. The most important officers of the Federal govern¬ 
ment are appointed by him. He has particular charge of our 
foreign relations, inasmuch as he can appoint ambassadors 
and other ministers to foreign governments and also receive 
or refuse to receive persons who are sent here to represent 
foreign nations. He draws up treaties with foreign nations, 
although they are not finally accepted unless two-thirds of 
the Senate vote to ratify them. 1 If the President dies or is 
unable to do his work the duties of the office are performed 
by the Vice-President. 

819. The Cabinet.—The Constitution does not provide 
for a cabinet although it does speak of heads of departments. 
When the government was first put into running order in 
Washington’s time, Congress established the Department of 
State, the Department of Treasury, the Post-office Depart¬ 
ment, and provided also for an Attorney-General. After a 
time, it became customary for the President to call these 
officers together into a sort of council to consider important 
and difficult matters. This body was called the cabinet. As 
the years went by, other departments were established and 
the heads of these departments were called by the President 

1 The actual correspondence and other work with foreign govern¬ 
ments is in charge of the Secretary of State. Treaties are often made 
by persons especially appointed or empowered to do so. Treaties are 
generally the result of long discussions with representatives of foreign 
nations, and of course may actually be drawn up, that is, actually 
written out and agreed upon, at Washington or at some foreign capital, 
or indeed at any other place where the persons appointed to do the 
work may meet. The treaty that ended the War of 1812 was made 
at Ghent in Belgium; the treaty ending the Spanish War, 1899, was made 
at Paris. The President, however, has the responsibility, even if he 
does not actually prepare the treaty, and he turns it over to the Senate 
for acceptance. 




494 


CONSTITUTION AND GOVERNMENT 


into his cabinet. The President is not under obligation to 
consult these men in a body. But as a matter of fact, the 
Presidents do so and all the members help to carry out the 
general plans of the administration. The cabinet members 
are now the Secretary of State, Secretary of Treasury, Secre¬ 
tary of War, Attorney-General, Postmaster-General, Sec¬ 
retary of the Navy, Secretary of the Interior, Secretary of 
Agriculture, Secretary of Commerce, and Secretary of Labor. 

£20. Departments.—There are, as we have seen, ten ex¬ 
ecutive departments, each one of which is under the charge 
of a single person. All these persons are appointed by the 
President and can be removed by him. 

The Secretary of State carries on correspondence with our 
ministers sent to foreign countries, and takes care, in general, 
of foreign relations. Through his office, consuls are appointed 
whose business it is to reside in foreign cities and to help in 
all possible ways the rights and interests, especially business 
interests, of American citizens in those countries. 

The Treasury Department supervises the national banks of 
the country, takes care of the money of the government, has 
charge of the mint and of the collection of taxes. 

The duties of the War Department may perhaps be plain 
enough from its name. In time of peace it has general charge 
of the army; and in time of war, of course, its duties are much 
heavier. The United States has always had a very small 
army in comparison with most European countries. In 1914, 
the total army, including the officers, amounted to about 
90,000 men. The recent army bill passed by Congress in 
1916 provides for an army of about 225,000. 

The Department of Justice takes care of the law business 
of the government. The head of this department is the 
Attorney-General. He is the legal adviser of the President. 
He and other officers in his department represent the United 
States in suits in which the United States government is 
interested. 

The Post-office Department, the head of which is the Post- 


OF THE UNITED STATES 


495 


master-General, has general charge of the whole post-office 
system and is, therefore, responsible for a great many officers 
and a vast amount of business. There are at the present 
time nearly 60,000 post-offices, and in 1914 the money re¬ 
ceived amounted to nearly $290,000,000. Some notion of 
the extent of the post-office business may be gathered from 
the fact that the railroads upon which mail was carried 
are altogether more than 250,000 miles in length. That 
means, if they were a single road, it might circle the globe 
ten times. 1 

Among the recent acts of the United States government 
is one establishing the postal savings bank. The purpose 
was to induce people to save small sums of money by giving 
them a place where they might put the money and be sure 
that it would not be lost or stolen. While this system has 
been successful, it is not, as yet, used anywhere nearly so 
widely as it probably will be in years to come; there is on 
deposit something over $60,000,000. The government pays 
two per cent a year on money deposited; anyone over ten 
years of age can put his money in, and one may begin by 
depositing a very small sum, even as low as one dollar. 2 

Under the parcels post system (established by the act ap¬ 
proved August 24, 1912) it is possible to send parcels not 
exceeding certain specifications in size and weight as fourth 
class mail matter. For this purpose the United States has 
been divided into a number of zones. The cost of sending a 
parcel is determined by its weight and the distance from the 
mailing point of the zone to which it is to be sent. Recent 
changes in the original act have made it possible to insure 
and to send C. O. D. parcels mailed via parcels post. An 
idea of the enormous amount of business done by the parcels 
post may be gained from the estimate that 800,000,000 
packages are handled by it annually. 

1 The total length of all post-office routes is over 435,000 miles. 

2 Amounts less than a dollar may be saved thus by buying postal 
saving cards and postal saving stamps. 

31 



496 


CONSTITUTION AND GOVERNMENT 


The parcels post system has contributed greatly to dimin¬ 
ishing shipping costs in this country and to making our 
facilities in this respect as good as those in Europe. We now 
wonder that we delayed so long in establishing this useful 
addition to our postal service. 

The Navy Department, the head of which is the Secretary 
of the Navy, has charge of the warships of the United States 
and of the men engaged in the naval service. Congress has 
recently provided for considerable addition to the navy in 
order to make it one of the largest navies in the world. At 
the present time (1916) it probably ranks about third. In 
1914, there were three hundred and thirty-six vessels of all 
kinds that were finished and ready for service. 

The Department of the Interior has a great many different 
kinds of duties. It has oversight of Indian affairs, mines, 
pensions, patents, education, and such public lands as belong 
to the national government. One of the important divisions 
of this department is the Geological Survey, which is engaged 
in making a careful survey of the whole country and gathering 
information concerning w^ater and mineral resources. Its 
work has been of great value in enabling people to know just 
what the natural resources of the country are. 

The duties of the Department of Agriculture are to study 
the questions which are of interest to the farmer, to gather 
important information and help in various ways in building 
up the prosperity and wealth of the country as far as that 
can be done by proper attention to best methods of farming. 
It issues very important statistics showing the amount of 
crops of various kinds that are raised in the country, it 
studies different kinds of soil, and sends out bulletins to show 
how soil may be treated in order to raise the best crops. It 
also sends out information concerning harmful insects, looks 
after the forest reserves of the United States, and gives 
advice to private owners about the care of their forests. 
Special investigations are often made of diseases of animals 
and steps are taken to prevent the spread of diseases from 


OF THE UNITED STATES 


497 


one portion of the country to another. Perhaps no other 
department of our government has been so useful in helping 
the ordinary citizen in actually adding to the wealth of the 
country, although this has largely been done by gathering 
information and sending it out to those who are actively 
engaged in agricultural work. 

The Department of Commerce, at the head of which is the 
Secretary of Commerce, has for its chief duty the collection 
of information concerning the general business of the coun¬ 
try and the way in which it is carried on. It looks after 
lighthouses, inspection and licensing of boats, and has gen¬ 
eral charge of the census. The Constitution provides that 
the census be taken every ten years. On the basis of this 
census Congress decides how many representatives in Con¬ 
gress shall be assigned to each state. In taking the census 
much more is done than merely numbering the people. 
Information is gathered on manufacturing, mining, and com¬ 
merce; and various reports are published showing the condi¬ 
tion of the country in its different activities. The census 
bureau, which is now a permanent bureau, gathers a great 
deal of material in addition to that which is gathered every 
ten years when the big census is taken. 

The Department of Labor was first established in 1913. 
Before that time it was for some years connected with the 
Department of Commerce. Its purpose is to care for the 
welfare of the wage-earners of the LTnited States, to improve 
their working conditions, and to help them in their opportuni¬ 
ties for improvement. Connected with this department is a 
Children’s Bureau, the chief duty of which is to study all 
matters which have to do with the welfare of children and 
child life, and to gather and publish information for the 
benefit of the people. 

821. The Revenues of the Government. —The United 
States has various sources of revenue. The larger part of 
the money comes from the customs and internal revenue. 
By the customs or tariff duties are meant the taxes which 


498 


CONSTITUTION AND GOVERNMENT 


must be paid on goods brought into this country from foreign 
countries. To collect this money customs offices are estab¬ 
lished at various ports, the most important one being, of 
course, the port of New York, where a very large portion 
of the foreign commerce of the country is carried on. The 
internal revenue since the war comes from a large variety 
of taxes, from taxes levied on liquor and tobacco. In 
addition to these sources of income the government obtains 
money from the postal service, although it commonly 
expends more money in running the post-office than is 
received from the sales of stamps. 

Much revenue now comes from the tax on corporation and 
private incomes; every unmarried person with an income of 
over $1,000 a year has to pay the government of the United 
States at a certain rate on his income above that sum. A 
married man has to pay at that rate on all income above 
$2,000. The income tax law also provides for what is called 
a graduated tax; that is to say, those receiving large incomes 
have to pay at a higher rate than those having smaller. Dur¬ 
ing and since the war the rates were greatly increased over 
the original rates. The total revenue of the government 
before the war was about $700,000,000 a year; 1 it is now at 
least five times that amount, and most of it comes from 
income and profits taxes. 

822. Naturalization.—Persons born in foreign lands may 
be made citizens of the United States by a process known as 
naturalization. Naturalized persons have all the rights of 
citizens of the United States, except that no one of them can 
be elected to the presidency. Naturalization is in charge of 
the Department of Labor. A person must declare his inten¬ 
tion to become a citizen two years before admission to citi¬ 
zenship and he must have resided in the country five years 
before he made his application for admission. The final steps 

1 In 1915, the government received over $39,000,000 from taxes on 
corporations, and over $41,000,000 from taxes on private incomes. In 
1915, the total revenue was $696,000,000 from all sources. 





OF THE UNITED STATES 


499 


of admission are taken before a court. The applicant must 
show that he can speak English and must sign his application 
in his own handwriting. Anyone returning to a foreign 
country within, five years after his naturalization may lose 
his citizenship unless he shows that he obtained his naturali¬ 
zation honestly and with real intention to remain a citizen 
of the United States. 1 

823. Copyrights.—The Constitution provides that Con¬ 
gress may pass laws to secure “for a limited time to authors 
and inventors the exclusive right to their writings and dis¬ 
coveries.In carrying out this clause of the Constitution, 
Congress has provided for copyrights and patents. When 
an author copyrights a book, he has control over it so that 
no one else can publish the book and thus rob him of his 
profits, if perchance there be any. An American author can 
have this exclusive right for twenty-eight years with the right 
of renewal for the same length of time. Sometimes books are 
copyrighted in the names of the publisher instead of the 
author. You will commonly find the copyright statement 
on the back of the title page of a book. 

824. Patents.—As authors are secured in the possession of 
their rights by copyrights, so inventors are protected by 
patents. A person who has invented or discovered a new 
machine secures from the Patent Office in Washington the 
sole right to make or sell the machine. The American peo¬ 
ple have always been a very inventive people and the number 
of patents issued in a single year is astonishing. In 1914 
there were 41,850 patents issued, and the number has been 
nearly as large for several years past. 

825. Weights and Measures.—The Constitution gives 
Congress the power “to fix the standard of weights and 

1 There are, as everyone knows, many persons in this country who 
were born abroad. Many of them have become American citizens. 
In 1910, about three-fourths of the total population were white people 
born in the United States, about one-seventh were foreign-bom 
whites. 



500 


CONSTITUTION AND GOVERNMENT 


measures,” and Congress has established the Bureau of 
Standards in the Department of Commerce. The work of 
this bureau in recent years has become of value, for it not 
only accurately fixes standards of measurement of all kinds, 
but compares standards that are in use with the govern¬ 
mental standards. It is important that we should have 
somewhere the exact measures by which we can know just 
what any unit of weight or measure is. It is not enough to 
speak of barrels, or bushels, or pounds without having some 
definite and unchanging standard. 

826. Weather Bureau.—One of the bureaus of the Depart¬ 
ment of Agriculture in which we all take interest is the 
Weather Bureau. It is engaged in the study of the problems 
of weather and of foretelling what the weather is to be, and 
it issues regular bulletins telling what the weather is likely to 
be during the next day or two. It tries, in this way, to be of 
service to shipmasters by warning them of approaching 
storms, also to warn of dangers from floods like those some¬ 
times occurring by the rising of the Ohio and the Mississippi 
rivers. It helps the farmer by foretelling the coming of 
storms or cold waves. We have all become so dependent on 
the bulletins of the bureau, as they are daily published, that 
we are likely, before going out for the daj^, to glance at the 
morning newspaper to help us decide whether to take our 
umbrellas or leave them at home. 

827. Interstate Commerce Commission.—The Interstate 
Commerce Commission was established in 1887. It is now 
an independent body, unconnected with any executive de¬ 
partment. The reason for its establishment was that the 
railroads, running from one state to another, could not be 
controlled or regulated in many ways by the state govern¬ 
ments, because Congress has the right and duty to regulate 
commerce “among the several states.” The railroads were 
declared to be acting unfairly and to be discriminating against 
small shippers or against one place in favor of another; 
charges for service were not uniform. The power of the com- 


OF THE UNITED STATES 


501 


mission has been enlarged at various times. It is now com¬ 
posed of seven members. Its chief business is to inquire into 
rates charged by the railroads and to prevent the charging of 
unfair or improper rates for service. 

828. Federal Trade Commission.—The purpose of this 
commission is to give, as far as possible, equal business op¬ 
portunity to all persons, and to prevent unfair or improper 
methods of competition. 

This commission was created by the Federal Trade Com¬ 
mission Act of 1914. It is made up of five commissioners 
who are appointed by the President, subject to the confirma¬ 
tion of the Senate. Its powers of regulating trade are similar 
to those the Interstate Commerce Commission exercises in 
the oversight of interstate traffic. 

829. Federal Reserve Banks.—The money and banking 
questions have been a matter of dispute in one form or an¬ 
other from the very foundation of the government. It has 
been no light task to work out proper and suitable measures 
for regulation. We are now hoping that the new Federal 
Reserve Act will have solved permanently some of the 
most difficult problems. The act provides for the establish¬ 
ment of twelve banks, one in each of twelve regions into 
which the whole country is divided. The national banks and 
the state banks coming into this system place in one of these 
reserve banks a considerable portion of the money which they 
have and need to keep in order to meet demands made on 
them by depositors. In times past it was often difficult to 
get money just when it was most needed. A bank does not, 
of course, keep all its money in its vaults; it lends it out to 
borrowers, thus lending the money of its depositors. Now if 
there comes a great panic or pressure for money, the bank 
cannot immediately get back all the money it has loaned to 
borrowers; it may therefore have to refuse to lend money to 
those needing it, or possibly even for a time refuse to pay its 
depositors. Under the new system a bank can take certain 
classes of “ paper” to a federal reserve bank, and the bank 


502 


CONSTITUTION AND GOVERNMENT 


can issue money and thus increase the amount of money that 
can be used in business. 1 

830. Amendments.—Amendments may be made to the 
Constitution in more than one way (see Constitution, Art. V), 
but only one method has actually been followed. Amend¬ 
ments have to be passed by a vote of two-thirds of each 
house of Congress and “ratified,” that is, accepted, by the 
legislatures of three-fourths of the states. The first ten 
amendments were added soon after the Constitution w*as 
adopted; they were adopted to quiet the fears of those who 
thought the national government might use its power to 
take away the liberties of the people; such persons wished 
plain statements of some things the government cannot do; 
their amendments are like the bills of rights in the State 
Constitution. 2 The eleventh amendment, adopted near the 
end of the eighteenth century, marks out clearly one kind of 
case that cannot come before the federal courts. The twelfth 
(1804) changed in one or two particulars the method of 


1 Some persons will say: “Why should a bank have the right to make 
and issue money?” But let us remember that by giving out paper to 
circulate as money, a bank is not making wealth. Money is a con¬ 
venience in the conduct of business and the money system should be as 
convenient as it can be made. A person borrowing of a bank and getting 
money does not get something for nothing; he has property, but he may 
need money badly. If he has, let us say, railroad stock, he is part 
owner of a railroad; now suppose he goes to a bank and says: “I need 
some money very much and I will leave this railroad stock with you 
to be sold in case I don’t pay back the sum I borrow.” He may have 
a good deal of other property and the bank may know that he is “per' 
fectly good”; and yet it may be that the bank would have to say, “You 
have property and evidence of real wealth, but we cannot let you have 
money even on perfect security, because everybody is wanting money 
and we cannot lend any more.” The federal reserve system now gives 
the bank the right to go to the federal reserve bank and say, “Here is 
perfectly good paper, evidence of real wealth, if not wealth itself; I 
want you to issue money, federal reserve notes, and let me have it so 
that I can lend it out to people who need it.” 

2 See page 166. 



OF THE UNITED STATES 


503 


choosing the President and Vice-President, for at first each 
elector cast a ballot for two persons without saying which he 
voted for for President and which for Vice-President. 1 The 
thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth amendments were the 
result of the great Civil War and the struggle over slavery 
and the rights of the negroes. The sixteenth amendment was 
adopted in 1913. It gives Congress power to levy direct 
taxes without dividing the burden among the states on the 
basis of population as the Constitution originally required. 

The seventeenth amendment (1913) provides for the elec¬ 
tion of senators by direct vote of the people. 2 

The eighteenth or Prohobition amendment (1919), forbids 
the manufacture, sale or transportation of intoxicating 
liquors. 

The nineteenth amendment (1920), which extends the 
suffrage to women, 3 is the latest addition to the Constitution. 


1 See pages 231, 287. 


2 See page 467. 


3 See page 458. 








j.fl 

■ 






































































IMPORTANT DATES IN UNITED STATES 

HISTORY 


IOOO (?). 
1492. 

1493 - 

1494. 

1497 * 

I5i3- 

1519-1521. 

1524. 

1527 - 1536 . 

I53I-I532. 

1534 - 1535 - 

1539- 1542. 

1540- 1541. 

1577 - 1580 . 

1584-1587. 


1604. 

1607. 

1608. 

1609. 

1614. 

1619. 


1620. 

1629. 

1630 . 
1632. 
2634. 


Norsemen discover America. 

• Columbus discovers America, October 1 2th. 

The Bull of Demarcation. 

The Treaty of Division. 

John Cabot touches the main land at the north. 

Balboa sees the Pacific Ocean, February. 

Ponce de Leon goes to Florida. 

Cortes conquers Mexico. 

Magellan’s ships voyage around the world. 

Verrazano explores the Atlantic coast. 

Cabega de Vaca explores southern United States. 

Piazarro conquers Peru. 

Cartier in Canada. 

De Soto in southern part of United States. (Discovers 
Mississippi River, 1541.) 

Coronado explores the Southwest. 

Drake in the Pacific. (Sails around the world, 1579.) 

Sir Walter Raleigh sends an exploring expedition to the 
eastern coast of America and attempts a settlement on 
Roanoke Island. 

Acadia settled by the French. 

Virginia founded at Jamestown, May 13 th. 

Quebec founded by Champlain. 

Champlain’s fight with the Iroquois. 

Hudson enters the Hudson River, September. 

New Netherland founded. 

Representative government in Virginia. 

Slavery introduced into Virginia. 

Landing at Plymouth, December 1 1th. 

Massachusetts Bay Company chartered. 

Migration to Massachusetts and founding of Boston. 
Maryland charter. 

Maryland settled at St. Mary’s, March. 

i 



ii IMPORTANT DATES IN UNITED STATES HISTORY 


1635. 

1636. 

1637- 

".638. 

1639. 

1643. 

1662. 

1663. 
1663-1665. 

1664. 

1665. 

1673- 

.1681-1682. 

1681. 

1682. 
1688. 

1689-1697. 

1691. 

1702-1713. 

1719-1729. 

1732. 

1733 - 

1734 - 
1744-1748. 

I 75 ^* 

1754-1763. 

1755 - 

1757 - 

1758 . 

1759 - 

1761. 

1763- 

1765 - 

1766. 

1767. 

1768. 
1772. 


Connecticut settled. 

Rhode Island settled at Providence by Roger Williams. 
Rhode Island settled by Ann Hutchinson and others. 
Pequot War. 

New Haven settled. 

Delaware settled by the Swedes. 

“Fundamental Orders” in Connecticut. 

New England Confederation formed. 

Connecticut obtains charter. 

Rhode Island obtains charter. 

Carolinas obtain charters. 

New Netherland becomes New York. 

New Jersey founded. 

Marquette and Joliet in the West. 

La Salle explores the Mississippi and claims Louisiana foi 
France. 

Pennsylvania charter granted. 

Pennsylvania founded. 

The English Revolution. 

King William’s War. 

The second Massachusetts charter granted. 

Queen Anne’s War. 

The Carolinas become royal provinces. 

The Georgia charter. 

Georgia settled. 

The trial of Zenger. 

King George’s War. 

Albany Plan of Union. 

The French and Indian War. 

Braddock’s defeat at Fort Duquesne, July 9th. 

French capture Forts William Henry and Ticonderoga. 
English capture Forts Duquesne and Frontenac. 

Capture of Quebec, September 17th. 

The Writs of Assistance. 

Treaty of Paris. 

The Parsons’ Cause. 

The Stamp Act passed. 

The Stamp Act Congress. 

Declaratory Act passed, March 7th. 

Stamp Act repealed, March IS th. 

The Townshend Acts passed, June. 

The Massachusetts Circular Letter sent out. 

The burning of the Gaspce. 


IMPORTANT DATES IN UNITED STATES HISTORY iii 


1773 - 

1774 - 


1775 - 


1776. 


1777. 


1777 - 1778 . 

1778. 

1780. 

1781. 


1783. 

1786. 

1787. 


1788. 

1789. 
1789-1791. 

1791. 

1792. 

1793 . 

1794. 
1798-1799. 

1798. 

1800. 

1803. 

1804. 

1807. 

1812-1815. 

1813. 


The Boston Tea Party, December 16 th. 

Boston Port Bill goes into effect, June 1st. 

The Quebec Act passed. 

The First Continental Congress meets, September 5th. 
Battles of Lexington and Concord. April 1 9th. 

Second Continental Congress meets, May 10 th. 

Battle of Bunker Hill, June 17 th. 

Declaration of Independence signed, July 4 th. 

Battle of Long Island, August 27th. 

Battle of Trenton, December 26 th. 

Battle of Princeton, January 3d. 

Howe enters hiladelphia, September 26 th. 

Battle of Saratoga and Burgoyne’s surrender, October 17 th. 
Washington’s army winters at Valley Forge. 

French Treaty of Alliance ratified, February 6 th. 

British leave Philadelphia, June 18 th. 

Arnold’s treason, September. 

Battle of Cowpens, January 17 th. 

Ratification of Articles of Confederation by the last state, 
March 1st. 

Surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown, October 19 th. 

Treaty of Peace with England signed, September 3d. 
Annapolis Convention, September. 

Federal Convention at Philadelphia frames the Constitu¬ 
tion. 

The Northwest Ordinance adopted by Congress, July 13 th. 
Constitution adopted, June 21s£. 

Constitution goes into effect, March 4 th. 

First ten amendments to Constitution ratified. 

United States Bank established. 

United States Mint established. 

Whitney invents the cotton gin. 

The Jay Treaty ratified, November 19 th. 

Virginia-Kentucky Resolutions. 

Eleventh Amendment to Constitution ratified. 

City of Washington becomes the national capital. 

Purchase of Louisiana. Treaty signed, A pril 30 th. 

Twelfth Amendment to Constitution ratified. 

Lewis and Clarke Expedition. 

Fulton steams up the Hudson in the Clermont , August 11 th. 
The Embargo Act, December 22 d. 

War with England. 

Battle of Lake Erie, September 10 th. 


iv IMPORTANT DATES IN UNITED STATES HISTORY 


1814. 

1815. 
1819-1821. 

1820. 

1823. 

1829. 

1830. 
1832. 

1835-1837. 

1844. 

1845. 
1846-1848. 

1847. 

1848. 
1850. 

1853. 

1854. 

1857- 

1858. 

1860. 
2861-1865. 

1861. 

1862. 


1863. 


1864. 


Hartford Convention, December. 

Battle of New Orleans, January 8th. 

Annexation of Florida. 

Missouri Compromise Act passed. 

Monroe Doctrine published, December 2d. 

Beginning of the Spoils System in the National Govern¬ 
ment. 

Opening of the first steam railway in the United States. 
Nullification ordinance passed in South Carolina, Novem¬ 
ber 19 th. 

Abolitionism and Antislavery petitions presented to 
Congress. 

Morse sends the first telegraph message, May 24th. 

Texas annexed, March. 

Mexican War. 

Fall of the City of Mexico, September 1 4th. 

Annexation of California and the Great Southwest. 
Compromise on Slavery in new states, September. 

Gadsden Purchase negotiated, December 30th. 
Ivansas-Nebraska Bill passed, May 30th. 

Dred Scott decision published, March Oth. 

First Atlantic cable laid. 

Lincoln-Douglas debates. 

South Carolina secedes, December 20th. 

Civil War. 

Fort Sumter fired upon, April 12th. 

Battle of Bull Run, July 21st. 

Attack on Fort Henry, February Oth. 

Attack on Fort Donelson, February 10th. 

Battle between the Monitor and the Merrimac, March 9th. 
Battle of Shiloh, April Qth-7th. 

Farragut takes New Orleans, April 25th. 

Seven Days’ Battle, June 25th-July 1st. 

Pope’s campaign in Virginia, August. 

Second battle of Bull Run, August 30th. 

Battle of Fredericksburg, December 13th. 

Emancipation Proclamation, January 1st. 

Battle of Chancellorsville, May 2d-3d. 

Battle of Gettysburg, July lst-3d. 

Fall of Vicksburg, July 4th. 

Campaign of the Wilderness, May. 

Battle of Cold Harbor, June 3d. 

Battle of Mobile Bay, August 5th. 


IMPORTANT DATES IN UNITED STATES HISTORY V 


1864. 

1865. 


1866-1877. 

1867. 

1868. 


1869. 

1870. 

1876. 

1883. 

1887. 

1890. 

1898. 


1899. 

1904. 

1907. 

1913- 


1914. 


1915- 


1917. 

1918. 

1919. 


Sherman takes Atlanta, September 2d. 

Sherman takes Savannah, December 22d. 

Capture of Petersburg, April 2d. 

Grant takes Richmond, April 3d. 

Surrender of Lee, April 9th. 

Assassination of Lincoln, April 1 4th. 

Thirteenth Amendment proclaimed (Slavery forbidden), 
December 18th. 

Period ol Reconstruction. 

Annexation of Alaska, June 20th. 

Impeachment of Andrew Johnson, March-May. 

Fourteenth Amendment to Constitution proclaimed, July 
28th. 

Pacific Railroad completed, May 10th. 

Fifteenth Amendment to Constitution proclaimed, March 
80th. 

Centennial Exposition held. 

Civil Service Act passed, January 10th. 

First Interstate Commerce Act passed, February 4 th. 
Sherman Silver Act approved, July lUli. 

War with Spain. 

Destruction of the Maine, February 15 th. 

Battle of Manila Bay, May lsb 
Annexation of Hawaiian Islands, July 7th. 

Annexation of Porto Rico, October 18 th. 

Annexation of Guam, December 10 th. 

Treaty of Peace with Spain ratified, February 0th. 
Annexation of Philippine Islands. 

Annexation of Canal strip, February 23 d. 

A wireless message sent across the Atlantic. 

Sixteenth Amendment to Constitution proclaimed, Febru¬ 
ary 25 th. 

Seventeenth Amendment to Constitution proclaimed, May 
31 st. 

Opening of the Panama Canal to Commerce, August 16, 
1914. 

Opening of the Panama-Pacific Exposition at San Fran¬ 
cisco, February 20, 1915. 

Sinking of the Lusitania , May 7th. 

State of War with Germany declared, April 0th. 

Armistice with Germany arranged, November 11th. 
Eighteenth Amendment to Constitution proclaimed, 
January 29 th. 

Treaty of Peace signed at Paris, June 28th. 





QUESTIONS * * 


i 

1 . Using the Mediterranean Sea as a center, draw an outline map of 
those parts of the earth known to the geographers of the fifteenth cen¬ 
tury. 2. Tell what the men of this century thought about the unex¬ 
plored sea. 3 . Explain how the fear of the sea kept men from the 
knowledge of the shape of the earth. 4 . What were the Crusades? 
5 . Mention two men who by their writings added much to men’s interest 
5n the East. 6. How did the Crusades change European thought and 
life? 7 . What discoveries and inventions made up a part of the new 
learning? 8. Name the two cities most active in carrying on trade 
between Europe and the Far East, and tell how this traffic was threatened 
in the fourteenth century. 9 . How did the Ottoman Turks uncon¬ 
sciously benefit the world? 10. Speak of the explorations of Prince 
Henry, Diaz, and Vasco de Gama. 11. How did the explorations of 
these men help open the way to the discovery of America? 

II 

1 . What influenced Columbus to think of sailing westward to find 
India? 2 . Give the story of Leif, the Norseman. 3 . Was this story 
unknown to Columbus? 4 . From whom did Columbus ask assistance? 
o. How were his plans received? 6. Mention the difficulties of this 
first voyage to the West. 7 . Give an imaginary description of his visit 
to San Salvador. 8. How was he disappointed in his visits to Cuba 
and Haiti? 9. With what belief did he return to Spain? 10. How was 
he received? 11. Explain why Columbus died in obscurity. 12. What 
did Columbus think about the result of his voyage? 13 . Why was 
the New World not named for him? 

III 

1 . Was the outline of the New World known after the first voyage 
of discovery? 2. Tell why Europeans were drawn to the New World. 
3 . Name two important geographical facts which were proved by 
Balboa and Magellan. 4 . How did Florida receive its name? 5 . Tell 
about its discovery. 6. What men first explored the eastern coast of 

* Prepared by Miss Carrie L. Dicken, Principal of the Perry School, Ann Arbor, 
.Michigan. 

• • 

Til 





Vlll 


QUESTIONS 


North America? 7. Why were the earliest permanent settlements in 
the New World made in Mexico and Peru? 8. Tell the story of 
Narvaez and his followers. 9 . Describe the discovery of the Missis¬ 
sippi. 10. Compare the story of Coronado with that of De Soto. 11. 
Were their discoveries of equal importance to the world? 12. What 
was the result of these early Spanish explorations? 13 . When and how 
did the French secure a foothold in America? 14 . What facts in 
geography helped French exploration in the interior? 15 . Tell what 
was known of the interior of North America in the sixteenth century. 
16 . Describe the inhabitants found by the explorers in the New 
World. 17 . Explain how the conquering of difficulties changed the 
lives of the early settlers in America. 

IV 

1. Name certain conditions in Europe w'hicli caused men to seek 
homes in the New World. 2. What is meant by the Reformation? 
3 . Why was Spain better prepared than other countries of Europe to 
colonize America? 4 . Show that Columbus was a colonizer as well as 
a discoverer. 5 . Tell something of the rapid growth of Spanish col¬ 
onies during the sixteenth century. 6. What products brought the 
greatest riches to Spain? 7 . Did the piracy of these times help or hin¬ 
der the work of colonizing America? 8. Why did Spain not extend 
her colonies farther into North America? 9 . Who were the Huguenots? 
10. Why did they come to America? 11. Tell the story of the first two 
French colonies. 12. When and by whom was St. Augustine founded? 

V 

1 . How do you account for Spain’s weakness in the seventeenth cen¬ 
tury? 2 . Explain the meaning of a colonial empire. 3 . Give the early 
history of Acadia, and compare its latitude with that of France. 4 . 
Who was the founder of New France? 5 . What great mistake did he 
make? 6. How did the English, in later years, profit by this mistake? 

7 . In what ways did the Jesuit missionaries seek to undo his blunder? 

8 . Tell the wonderful story of La Salle. 9 . How did France mark the 
great waterways of which she gained possession? 10. What settlements 
were made to guard these possessions? 11. What French names still 
remain where these settlements were made? 

VI 

1. Show how England, by its geographical position, seemed fitted to 
lead the European nations in western trade. 2. By whose discoveries 
did England claim the right to colonize America? 3. Why did Spain 


QUESTIONS 


IX 


begin trading in America so much earlier than England? 4. Tell the 
story of John Hawkins and of Francis Drake. 5 . Was Drake a pirate 
or not? 6. What did his voyage around the world mean to England? 
7 . To Spain? 8 . Tell something of England’s settlement on Roanoke 
Island? 9 . Why was the Spanish Armada built? 10 . Give its history. 
11. How did the fate of the Armada have an effect on American coloni¬ 
zation? 


VII 

1. What is meant by the words “company,” “share,” and “char¬ 
ter”? 2. What conditions in England tended to promote an interest 
in colonial work? 3 . Give the purpose of the London and Plymouth 
Companies. 4 . Where did the Plymouth Company attempt a settle¬ 
ment? 5 . What was the result? 6 . Show that the first settlers in Vir¬ 
ginia were unfit for colonial life. 7 . By what unwise plan did the 
London Company encourage idleness? 8. Tell the story of John Smith’s 
efforts to save the colony. 9 . How did the Company show its approval 
of Smith’s plan in its new charter of 1609? 10. What changes were 

brought about by the new governor? 11. What was the “House of 
Burgesses”? 12. Why is it said that our method of government had 
its origin here in 1619? 13 . How do you account for the fact that 

Virginia so soon had such a form of government? 14 . In what way 
did the king show his disapproval of this plan of government? 15 . 
What did the loss of its charter mean to the London Company? 16 . To 
the colony? 17 . What sources of wealth made the permanency of the 
Virginia colonies an assured fact? 

VIII 

1. The Reformation caused what change in the Catholic church of 
England? 2 . Who were the Puritans? 3 . Why were some of the 
Puritans called Separatists? 4 . Describe the people led by John 
Robinson into Holland. 5 . How did their life in Holland differ from 
that in England? 6. What turned their thoughts toward America? 
7. Tell of their difficulties in getting started and of their voyage. 8. 
How were they disappointed in their landing in America? 9 . Why did 
the Pilgrim leaders not rule by force, instead of getting the ship’s com¬ 
pany to sign a compact? 10. What qualities in these Pilgrims do you 
most admire? 11 . Show how bravely they met and overcame the diffi¬ 
culties of the New World. 

IX 


1. Show that a missionary spirit led to the great movement in the 
settlement of New England. 2. Mention conditions in England which 
gave an added impulse to this movement. 3 . Under what charter was 


X 


QUESTIONS 


the Massachusetts Bay colony founded? 4 . What change in the 
method of ruling the settlers brought great men to America? 5 . Com¬ 
pare these men with those that settled Plymouth and Jamestown. 6. 
Tell what you know of John Winthrop and the beginning of Boston. 7 . 
Trace the growth of towns in New England. 8. Describe the town as 
the unit of political and social life. 9 . Give some reasons for this 
growth of towns in New England. 10. By what wise plans did the 
leaders of the Massachusetts Bay Company increase their number? 11. 
Give the definite purpose for which this colony was founded. 12. Can 
you find here the beginning of our state government? 13 . How did the 
religious zeal of the leaders hinder the liberty which they had come here 
to seek? 14 . Show that this same zeal led to the beginning of our great 
educational system. 

X 

1 . On what principles did Roger Williams differ with the Puritan 
rulers? 2. How were ideas like his received by the nations of Europe 
in the seventeenth century? 3 . Give the two cliief reasons for his banish¬ 
ment. 4 . What does his banishment tell you about the leaders of 
Massachusetts? 5 . Give the great results of his banishment. 6 . How 
was Williams’ wisdom further shown in the government of Rhode Island? 
7 . Tell the story of the founding of the first English colonies in Con¬ 
necticut. 8. Compare Hooker’s ideas of government with those of 
Winthrop and of Williams. 9 . In what respect do his “Orders” 
resemble our state or national constitution? 10. For what purposes 
did men leave Massachusetts and penetrate the wildernesses of New 
Hampshire and Maine? 11. What led to the New England Confed¬ 
eration? 12. Tell of one occasion when it proved of great assistance to 
the colonists. 13 . Why did this Confederation not include all the New 
England colonies? 14 . Explain why this union for the purpose of pro¬ 
tection against a common enemy is of special interest to us. 15 . What 
do you know of the Quakers? 16 . Can you in any way justify Massa¬ 
chusetts in its treatment of them? 

XI 

1. What have you already learned of Holland’s position in the matter 
of religion during the seventeenth century? 2. Define her position in 
the commercial world. 3 . Tell the story of Henry Hudson. 4 . For 
what purpose were Fort Amsterdam and Fort Orange established? 5 . 
Why was the Dutch West India Company formed? 6. Compare the 
motive of the Dutch colonists in leaving Holland with that of the Pil¬ 
grims and Puritans in leaving England. 7 . Describe the patroon’s es¬ 
tates on the Hudson. 8. How did this plan differ from plantation life 
in Virginia? 9 . Give an account of Sweden’s brief attempt at coloniz- 


QUESTIONS xi 

ing America. 10. Show that unwise rulers weakened the power of the 
Dutch until they lost first Connecticut and then New Amsterdam. 11. 
What was England’s plan for the government of the Dutch colonists? 

12. IIow many nationalities can you find among the colonists of New 
Jersey? 13 . IIow do you account for their being there? 

XII 

1. Give the story of George Fox and of William Penn. 2. Name the 
five great ideas which sent Penn to America. 3 . What do we think of 
those ideas in America to-day? 4 . Give Penn’s plan of government, 
and of dealing with the Indians. 5 . What qualities were brought into 
Pennsylvania when the Germans and the Scotch-Irish came? 6. How 
did the Quaker differ from the Puritan in his opinion of the value of 
schools? 

XIII 

1 . Give the terms of the charter granted to Lord Baltimore. 2 . Why 
did Baltimore desire to found a colony? 3 . What is meant by tolera¬ 
tion? 4 . In what respects was the government of Maryland similar to 
that of Virginia? 5 . How did the establishment of homes in Maryland 
differ from the group settlements of New England? 6. Show that 
counties were more naturally formed here than in New England. 7 . 
Who were the first settlers of the Carolinas? 8. Make a list of the 
various classes of people that came to America to find a refuge from 
persecutions, and name the colonies to which each came. 9 . How did 
the “Grand Model” and its outcome clearly illustrate the political 
thought of the New World as compared with that of the Old? 10. 
What change in the government of the Carolinas came in the early part 
of the eighteenth century? 11. Compare life and prosperity in the two 
Carolinas with that in Virginia. 12. Describe Charleston at this time. 

13 . Why were the Spaniards interested in this southern movement of 
England’s colonies? 14 . Show that Georgia is not to be left off a list 
of colonies which became places of refuge. 15 . Read Dickens’ “Little 
Dorrit,” and get a picture of England’s debtors. 16 . When, and by 
whom was Savannah founded? 17 . What caused discontent in 
Georgia? 18 . How was peace restored? 

XIV 

1. Give a brief outline of the history of Charles I and Cromwell. 
2 . What political changes in England most affected the colonies? 3 . 
How did Virginia show its sympathy with King Charles? 4 . What was 
the result? 5. Show that while Virginia was adding to its numbers, 
New England was making a growth of far greater importance. 6. 


xii QUESTIONS 

Trace the events in English history immediately following Cromwell’s 
time. 7. What was the “Bill of Rights”? 8. How did Charles II 
show his interest in the colonies? 9. Which colony suffered the most? 
Why? 10. Tell what you know of Governor Berkeley. 11. How were 
the people of Virginia divided? 12. Give the causes and results of 
Bacon’s rebellion? 13. Why did the English government wish to unite 
the colonies? 14. Describe Andros. 15. Name the colonies over which 
he was made Governor-General. 16. How was his despotism brought 
to a close? 17. How long had Massachusetts been without a charter? 

18. Give the terms of her new charter. 19. Tell the story of Leisler. 
20. Define the Navigation Acts. 21. In view of these acts, do you 
think the colonists were justified in their smuggling? 22. In what ways 
did the royal governors oppose the colonial legislatures? 23. Review 
the relations of the colonies to the mother country and mention thf 
important facts to be remembered. 

XV 

1. What great natural wall hindered the westward movement of 
English colonists? 2. Why did they not use the natural gateways to 
the Mississippi Valley? 3. Show that the purpose of the English in 
coming to America differed from that of the French. 4. Explain how 
this difference in purpose made a difference in their relations with the 
Indians, as well as with the mother countries. 5. What European 
events led to King William’s war? 6. How were the colonies affected? 
7. Mention some of the events of Queen Anne’s and King George’s wars 
in America, and the results. 8. What important facts did these wars 
teach the French? 9. In what respects did Virginia’s pioneers in the 
west differ from her planters in the east? 10. Where did Virginia’s 
claims conflict with the French? 11. For what task did Governor 
Dinwiddie choose Washington, and why? 12. Describe Washington’s 
journey. 13. Give its results. 14. What was accomplished in the 
Albany meeting? 15. Give an account of Braddock’s defeat. 16. How 
did this war differ from the other wars mentioned in this chapter? 17. 
Tell what you can about William Pitt. 18. Mention some of the vie' 
tories which came to the English as the result of his wise leadership. 

19. Describe the taking of Quebec. 20. Give the terms of the Treaty 
of Paris. 21. Give the causes and results of the conspiracy of Pontiac, 

XVI 

1. Mention some of the words added to the English language by the 
colonists. 2. Describe the life of the colonial aristocrat. 3. Compare 
the homes of the common people in the colonies with those of the labor¬ 
ing people in your vicinity. 4. Mention various ways that social dis- 


QUESTIONS xiil 

tinction was shown among the colonists. 5. Give reasons for the 
division of the English colonies into three groups. 6. Compare the 
industries of the three sections. 7. Why did slavery become more firmly 
established in the Southern section? 8. Show that while the local gov¬ 
ernments in the colonies differed, yet all agreed in certain points. 9. 
What have you learned of the relation of Church and State in Puritan 
New England? 10. Describe the Puritan Sabbath. 11. Why were the 
Southern colonists less zealous in their religious life? 12. Mention some 
of the peculiar beliefs of the colonists. 13. Trace the beginnings of 
schools in the colonies. 14. What do you think of the books mentioned 
in the next to the last paragraph of this chapter? 15. What was the 
cause of Zenger’s trial, and what did the result show? 

XVII 

1. Show that the management of England’s American colonies de¬ 
manded wise statesmanship. 2. Why did the colonists feel more 
independent of England after 17G3? 3. Why did the English consider 

the colonists their inferiors? 4. By what four regulations did Parlia¬ 
ment plan to control American trade? 5. Define the “Writs of Assist¬ 
ance,” and tell how they were received in Massachusetts. 6. How did 
Virginia test the king’s power? 7. What was the Stamp Act? 8. Show 
that it was a much greater grievance than any of the acts previously 
mentioned in this chapter. 9. How was it received in the different 
colonies? 10. Quote Patrick Henry and compare his words with the 
sayings of James Otis in 1761. 11. Why did British merchants ask 

Parliament to repeal the Stamp Act? 12. In what respects did Amer¬ 
ica’s idea of representation differ from England’s? 13. What were the 
Townshend Acts? 14. How did they differ from the Stamp Act? 15. 
Tell about Samuel Adams. 16. What was written in his circular letter? 
17. What two great mistakes were made by the king? 18. Give the 
cause of the “Boston Massacre.” 19. Tell of the great work done by 
the “Committees of Correspondence.” 20. What moved George III 
to continue the one tax on tea? 21. How did he plan to tempt the 
colonists? 22. Give a word-picture of the “Boston Tea-Party.” 23. 
How did the “Committees of Correspondence” again prove their value? 
24. Mention the great leaders in the First Continental Congress. 25. 
What was done by this Congress? 26. How were its acts received (a) 
by the colonies, (b) by England? 27. Quote Pitt’s estimate of Congress. 

XVIII 

1. How did Boston receive General Gage? 2. Imagine yourself to 
be living in Lexington in 1775, and write in your own words the story 
of that month of April, adding any facts you may know to those given 


XIV 


QUESTIONS 


here. 3. Describe the besieging army around Boston. 4. What rea¬ 
sons have you for believing that this struggle between Whigs and Tories 
was more fierce in some colonies than in others? 5. How did scenes 
preceding the election influence the actions of the Second Continental 
Congress? 6. In what way was this Congress led to change its plans? 
7. What did it actually do? 8. Show that Washington was the right 
man to lead this undisciplined army. 9. Describe the Battle of Bunker 
Hill. 10. What did this battle teach the British? 11. What did it 
teach the Americans? 12. How did Washington persuade Howe to go 
to Nova Scotia? 13. Tell the story of the bravery of Arnold and 
Montgomery. 14. What would the capture of Quebec have meant? 

XIX 

1. Why were many of the colonists still loyal to King George? 2. 
Quote some of the arguments by which Paine roused the people to 
think and speak differently. 3. Give the steps by which Congress 
moved toward the Declaration of Independence. 4. Name the men who 
were most active in securing this end, and tell which colony each repre¬ 
sented. 5. Tell all you can of Jefferson’s history, and show that he was 
fitted to draw up such a wonderful paper. 6. Can you understand why 
many of the colonists feared independence? 7. What new problem did 
the Declaration bring to the colonies? 8. Show how it was solved 
under the leadership of John Adams. 9. Explain the meaning of a 
“bill of rights.” 10. Outline the general plan of the new state govern¬ 
ment, and show how it differs from our present plan. 11. How many 
years were given to the planning of the Articles of Confederation? 12. 
Why, then, was the plan doomed to be a failure? 

XX 

1. Tell how Charleston was saved by means of commonplace things. 
2. Why did England wish to cut off New England from the other col¬ 
onies? 3. Tell how Washington was aided by Nature to outwit Howe 
on Long Island. 4. What was General Carleton’s plan? 5. Why was it 
not carried out? 6. What did the loss of Fort Washington mean to the 
inexperienced American soldiers? 7. Describe their retreat. 8. Read 
of Lee’s disobedience. 9. How did Congress show its confidence in 
Washington? 10. Tell of his great victories at Trenton and Princeton, 
and explain their effect upon the thought of both Europe and America. 
11. Draw a map outlining the plan of the British for 1777. 12. Tell 

how General Schuyler and John Stark made unwelcome interruptions 
in Burgoyne’s part of this plan. 13. Give the history of St. Leger’s 
Dart in the campaign. 14. Why do historians say that Howe made a 
mistake in capturing Philadelphia at this time? 15. Describe Bur- 


QUESTIONS 


XV 


goyne’s final defeat, and name the causes. 16. Explain why the battle 
of Saratoga is listed as one of the great decisive battles of the world. 

XXI 

1. Why was France America’s friend? 2. How was the friendship 
shown? 3. Look up Franklin’s early history, and tell the story of this 
wonderful man. 4. Why should the battle of Saratoga have any 
influence upon the mind of the French king? 5. Tell of Valley Forge. 
6 . How did the “Conway Cabal” reveal Washington’s greatness? 7 . 
Can you see reasons why people praised Gates and criticised Washing¬ 
ton? 8. What was Baron Steuben’s part in the war? 9. Show the 
great contrast between the American and the British camps at this time. 
10. Describe the battle of Monmouth. 11. How did the British change 
their tactics in 1778, and what were some of the terrible results? 12. 
Who were the leaders in the great pioneer movement to the West? 13. 
Why did this movement excite the Indians? 14. Tell of the bravery of 
Clark and his followers. 15. Were they a part of Washington’s army? 
16. Show that, during 1778 and 1779, America suffered all the horrors 
of a civil war. 

XXII 

1. In what ways did France continue to help America? 2. Describe 
America’s first naval victory. 3. How did Congress seek to relieve the 
suffering of Washington’s army? 4. With what result? 5. Mention 
the different occasions when Arnold’s courage and energy accomplished 
great things for America. 6. Name that which changed him from a 
patriot to a traitor. 7. Tell what you know of the story of his life 
with the British? 8. Tell what you know of the method of warfare 
used by Marion, Sumter, and Pickens. 9. Describe the battles of Cam¬ 
den and King’s Mountain. 10. Why was Gates recalled? 11. Men¬ 
tion some of the great battles fought by Greene and Morgan, and give 
the results of them all. 12. Tell the story of Lafayette. 13. Why was 
he worthy the attention of two brilliant generals? 14. Show that the 
French were given honorable positions in the final scenes of this great 
war. 15. What changes came about in the English government as a 
result of Cornwallis’ surrender? 16. Give reasons for the selection of 
the three men who were chosen to make a treaty of peace. 17. Give 
the terms of the treaty. 18. Is Franklin’s statement, as quoted here, 
true of America to-day? Explain. 

XXIII 

1. Describe the home ties of the first settlers. 2. Contrast the polit¬ 
ical opinions of French, English, and Spanish settlers. 3. Trace the 
English Constitution from the Magna Carta. 4. What had English 


XVI 


QUESTIONS 


colonists learned concerning the position of a king? 5. Compare the 
Constitution of the United States with that of England. 6. To whom 
are we indebted for the principal ideas expressed in the Declaration of 
Independence? 7. Characterize the governments of Europe at the 
beginning of the 18th century. 8. Describe the rise and spread of the 
Reformation. 9. What was the effect on America? 10. Describe the 
reception of the United States into the “family of nations.” 11. Sketch 
the nations of Europe in 1783. 12. Indicate the sources of early Amer¬ 
ican immigrants. 13. Define our relations with England, France and 
Spain. 14. Describe the government of the West Indies. 15. Give the 
plan by which Spain governed her colonial possessions, and show its 
result. 16. What was the feeling of Europe toward the democracy of 
the new world? 17. Name the conditions in France which led to the 
French Revolution. 18. Show how the Revolution became the “reign 
of terror.” 19. Relate the principal facts of the rise and fall of Napoleon 
Bonaparte. 20. What part in this great struggle was played by Eng¬ 
land? 21. How was the United States affected? 

XXIV 

1. Show wherein Congress under the Articles of Confederation was 
weak. 2. Who was Robert Morris? 3. Why did he resign at this 
critical time? 4. Give reasons why the states hesitated to give more 
power to Congress. 5. What new difficulties came to America? 6. 
Prove that a central authority is necessary to control both interstate 
and foreign commerce. 7. What conditions led directly to Shays’s 
rebellion? 8. How was this insurrection an eye-opener? 9. What 
features in the Ordinance of 1787 still compel men to respect the Con¬ 
gress which framed it? 10. Quote Washington’s words regarding the 
need of a central power. 11. Give the purpose and result of the An¬ 
napolis convention. 12. Name some of the great men sent as delegates 
to the Constitutional convention. 13. Why did the work of this con¬ 
vention occupy four months? 14. Trace the steps by which the two 
houses of Congress were established. 15. What were the “slavery 
compromises’’? 16. What conditions made them necessary? 17. 
Why were the meetings of this convention held in secret? 18. Name 
the leading points wherein the new plan of government differed from the 
old. 19. How was it received by the States? 

XXV 

1. Compare the opportunities opening to the American people at the 
close of the eighteenth century with those offered to you to-day. 2. 
Explain why America was at this time “a land of farmers.” 3. De¬ 
scribe the cities of New York and Philadelphia in Washington’s day. 
4. Compare the homes of the rich and the poor at this time. 5. Where 
did America’s manufacturing have its beginning? 6. Why did New 
England lead in both commerce and manufacturing? 7. What inven¬ 
tion most interested the South? 8. How did this invention tend to 
separate the North and South? 9. Describe the different modes of 
travel in these days. 10. How did all this hinder the promotion of a 
union between states? 11 . What social and political problems also 
faced the people in their efforts to establish a democratic government? 


QUESTIONS 


XVII 


XXVI 

1. Show how the machinery of the new government was set in motion 
without political parties. 2. Describe Washington’s inaugural journey. 
3. Name the departments of government created and the men that 
Washington appointed to head each of them. 4. Who was the first 
chief justice? 5. How did the Cabinet come into being? 6 How did 
Washington maintain the dignity of his office? 7. Why did the people 
regard the customs officer as a necessary evil? 8. Give Hamilton’s plan 
for paying the national debt. 9. What great discussion arose over his 
proposal to establish a United States bank? 10. Describe the Whiskey 
Rebellion and its lesson to the states. 11. Show that the policy of the 
secretary of the treasury brought good results both at home and abroad. 
12. W rite biographical sketches of Hamilton and Jefferson. 13. How 
were their ideas of government opposed to each other? 14. Can you 
show that both were right? 15. Trace the beginning of political par¬ 
ties. 16. What helped men to decide on their party? 17. How can you 
justify the United States in its refusal to send aid to the French Revo¬ 
lutionists? 18. Compare the visit of “Citizen Genet” with Franklin’s 
visit to France during the American Revolution. 19. In what ways 
did England fail to keep all of her treaty of peace? 20. Tell what you 
have read of “ Mad Anthony ” and the Indians. 21. How do you explain 
the lack of confidence shown by the people at this time toward Washing¬ 
ton and his Cabinet? 22. What conditions called for a treaty with 
Spain? 23. What were the things to note in Washington’s “Farewell 
Address”? 


XXVII 

1. Describe the first presidential campaign with its curious results. 
2. What incident in France changed America’s sympathy to a feeling 
of indignation? 3. Tell the story of “X, Y, and Z.” 4. How was this 
story received by the American people? 5. Why did the peaceful policy 
of Adams displease Hamilton? 6. Give the three acts by which Con¬ 
gress sought to secure greater powers to the government. 7. What was 
the result of an effort to enforce these laws? 8. How could the Virginia 
and Kentucky Resolutions have been*used in later years to prove that 
Jefferson and Madison were the “fathers of nullification and secession”? 
9. Show how these laws influenced the next presidential election. 10. 
Describe the campaign and show that Hamilton was responsible for 
Jefferson’s election. 11. Why was it wise to elect a Republican Presi¬ 
dent at this time? 


XXVIII 

1. Give reasons for the removal of the capital to Washington. 2. 
What were Jefferson’s plans for relieving the nation of its debt? 3. 
Trace the chain of events which led to the purchase of Louisiana. 4. 
Why was Napoleon willing to part with his newly acquired treasure? 
5. What do you think of the price paid for it? 6. Why did Jefferson 
hesitate to sign the treaty which would give us Louisiana? 7. Describe 
the Lewis and Clark expedition and give its results. 8. What did the 
invention of the steamboat mean to the pioneers of the West? 


XV111 


QUESTIONS 


XXIX 


1. Explain why the people felt the need of the twelfth amendment to 
the Constitution. 2. Why had America paid tribute to the Barbary 
powers for so many years? 3. How did the quarrel between Napoleon 
and England affect American commerce? 4. How did America become 
involved in the Quarrel between England and France? 5. How did 
England further insult the American navy? 6. What did Jefferson hope 
to gain by the Embargo Act? 7. Why was it a failure? 8. How did 
the Non-intercourse Act differ from the Embargo? 9. Why did the 
people believe in Madison? 10. How was he disappointed in his deal¬ 
ings with England? 11. What did Congress hope to gain by the Macon 
Bill? 12. How did Napoleon play with Madison? 13. Tell the story 
of Tecumseh, and show reasons why America might hold England 
responsible for this trouble. 14. Who were Henry Clay and John C. 
Calhoun? 15. Give the leading points in the warlike message sent by 
the President to Congress. 16. How do you explain the change of mind 
that must have come to the peaceful Madison? 


XXX 

1. Compare the military strength of England and America in 1812. 
2. How did Congress plan for a short war? 3. Describe the events in 
the land campaign of 1812, and show why they were a failure. 4. Tell 
of Perry’s victory and of General Harrison’s successful work. 5. Make 
a list of the great naval engagements of the war with their results. 6. 
How did the merchant ships of both nations share in this conflict? 7. 
Show that Madison was not a model war President. 8. Why did New 
England object to the war? 9. How did European events tend to 
strengthen England’s power? 10. Show that the land battles of 1814 
brought no gain to either nation. 11. How did Baltimore escape when 
Washington was sacked? 12. Explain how it came about that a battle 
was fought after the treaty of peace had been signed. 13. Explain the 
success of the battle. 14. Tell what you know of the treaty of Ghent. 

15. Why did the Hartford Convention mean the end of the Federalists? 

16. Prove that this war brought beneficial results to America. 


XXXI 

1. Give a brief history of James Monroe. 2. Account for the rapid 
growth of the manufacturing industry during his administration. 3. 
Why did the people demand a higher tariff? 4. What kind of a tariff 
would have been a benefit to the South? 5. Give reasons for the great 
western movement in the early part of the nineteenth century? 6. 
What is said of the three routes most traveled in this movement? 7 . 
Describe the travelers themselves. 8. Where was the Cumberland 
Road? 9. When was it built? 10. What great scheme was proposed 
by De Witt Clinton? 11. Show the relation of the Erie Canal to the 
growth of New York City. 12. Why did the admission of Missouri into 
the Union present a difficult problem to Congress? 13. Why did 
slavery increase in the South and not in the North? 14. Name the 
slave states already in the Union when Missouri demanded admission. 
15. Look up the Ordinance of 1787 and tell what advantages it gave to 


QUESTIONS 


XIX 


the territories to be made from the Northwest. 16. What was the 
Missouri Compromise? 17. Justify General Jackson’s work in Florida. 
18. Show how the “Holy Alliance” led to the publication of the “Mon¬ 
roe Doctrine.” 19. Give the three points of this message and prove 
that they are principles universally accepted to-day. 


XXXII 

1. What ideas of government were held by John Quincy Adams and 
by Andrew Jackson? 2. Why were Clay and Jackson considered heroes? 
3. Show that each section of the Union had its peculiar interests. 4. 
How was Adams finally elected? 5. How did factional spirit affect his 
administration? 6. With what result to the Republican Party? 7. 
Give the names of the new parties. 8. How do you explain the fact 
that the Western states were first to have “manhood suffrage”? 9. In 
what year was a national nomination convention first held? 10. How 
was this to change the old plan for nominating a President? 11. What 
facts in the history of his time placed Jackson in office? 12. Trace the 
history of the American tariff. 13. How did the tariff question threaten 
the Union? 


XXXIII 

1. Read this chapter and prove that America had a right to be proud 
of her enterprise and prosperity. 2. What decided the location of 
Eastern cities? 3. How w r as the problem of their lighting and heating 
solved? 4. What is said of the marvelous growth in the West? 6. 
How had Western conditions transformed poor men into frontier leaders 
and national rulers? 6. Trace the growth of America’s railroad system. 
7. What advantage had the railroad over the canal as a means of 
transportation? 8. Prove that Charles Carroll was right in his state¬ 
ment as to the importance of railroads. 9. How did social reforms 
keep pace with other improvements? 10. How was the West enabled 
to keep pace with the East in the matter of education? 11. What names 
are associated with America’s first real literature? 


XXXIV 

1. How did Jackson’s inauguration typify the spirit of the West? 
2. Describe the new President. 3. Show the evils of the “Spoils Sys¬ 
tem.” 4. Define a “Gerrymander.” 6. What discussion led to the 
debate between Webster and Hayne? 6. Read carefully Webster’s 
speech and tell how he differed from Hayne. 7. Tell something of John 
Marshall and his work. 8. How did South Carolina bring the theories 
of Hayne to a practical test? 9. What was the purpose of the “Force 
Bill”? 10. How did Clay help to avert war? 11. Define Jackson’s 
position on these questions. 12. What were “wild-cat” banks? 13. 
Give reasons for Jackson’s opposition to the United States Bank. 14. 
How did he accomplish its destruction? 15. Prove that his plan for 
disposing of the public money was most unwise. 16. What did he 
hope to accomplish by his “Specie Circular”? 


XX 


QUESTIONS 


XXXV 

1. Tell what you know of Van Buren’s fitness for the presidential 
office at such a critical time. 2. Give the causes of the panic of 1837. 
3. What was Van Buren’s plan for solving the financial problems? 4. 
What changes were made in party names at this time? 5. Why was 
the name Whig a popular one? 6. Prove that Van Buren was unjustly 
criticised. 7. Give reasons for Harrison’s popularity. 8. How did his 
election show the growing power of the common people? 9. Explain 
the fact that the death of President Harrison left in the presidential 
chair a man entirely out of sympathy with the party which had elected 
him. 10. What was the result? li. Give the terms of the Webster- 
Ashburton Treaty, and show how it marked an important step in inter¬ 
national relations. 


XXXVI 


1. Who were the first Americans to oppose slavery? 2. What facts 
show that the thinking men of the South, as well as of the North, looked 
upon slavery as an evil? 3. Trace the growth of slavery in the West. 
4. How did this growth alter conditions surrounding the life of the 
slave? 5. What were the Southern ideas concerning the freeing of the 
slaves? 6. Tell of Garrison and his work. 7. Show that one reform 
leads to another. 8. Make a list of these reform movements which are 
still alive, and tell what you think has been accomplished by each. 9. 
When and where did Mormonism start? 10. What effect did the 
reform movement have on the question of slavery? 11. Mention the 
great writers who lent their influence to the antislavery cause. 12. 
Give some of their arguments. 13. How were they answered? 14. 
Show to what extent both sides were right. 15. Where did the agitation 
first become violent? 16. Define the terms “ freedom of press” and 
“right of petition.” 17. Explain the necessity for the noble fight of 
John Quincy Adams. 


XXXVII 

1. Trace on a map the northern boundary of Mexico previous to 
1821. 2. When and how did Texas become separated from Mexico? 

3. What was meant by the Oregon territory? 4. Why was it claimed 
by two nations? 5. How were the Texas and Oregon questions used 
in the presidential campaign? 6. Show that Clay caused his own de¬ 
feat. 7. How was Texas rushed into the Union? 8. Prove the falsity 
of Polk’s words concerning the origin of war with Mexico. 9. Give the 
plan of the Mexican War. 10. Tell of Taylor’s wonderful campaign. 
11. Compare Scott’s victories with Taylor’s. 12. Which represented 
the greater difficulties? Which, the greater results? 13. Show that 
California was an easy conquest. 14. Why did the United States feel 
obliged to pay such a sum for the southwestern territory, after fighting 
a victorious war for its possession? 15. How was the Oregon question 
settled without a war? 16, What was the Wilmot Proviso? 


QUESTIONS 


xxi 


XXXVIII 

1. Account for the fact that three parties were in the race for the 
election ot 1848. 2. Give the names of the three men nominated for 

the Presidency. 3. What principles were advocated by each? 4. 
U hen and where did the old Liberty Party originate? 6. What was 
the result ot the election? 6. Describe the excited rush for the gold 
fields. 7c Why did California so soon apply for admission into the 
Union as a state? 8. Give the four great problems which Congress 
had to face in December, 1849. 9. By what plan did Clay again seek 
to make peace? 10. What other great men shared in this discussion? 
11. How did Congress finally act? 12. Which of these measures was 
especially displeasing to the North? 13. Why? 14. What were the 
“Personal Liberty Laws”? 15. How did the people of the North still 
further show defiance to National law? 16. Can you justify these 
acts? 17. How did “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” appeal to the South, and to 
the North? 


XXXIX 

1. What did the great Democratic victory of 1852 show? 2. Men¬ 
tion some of the new inventions appearing in Pierce’s time. 3. Explain 
the fact that so many of these were of value to the North, and so few 
to the South. 4. Tell something of the rate of immigration to America 
in the first half of the nineteenth century. 5. Why did the immigrants 
turn to the North and West fo • homes? 6. What was the Know- 
nothing Party? 7. Compare the Missouri Compromise with the Kansas- 
Nebraska Bill. 8. Tell what Chase, Sumner, and Seward said of the 
Bill. 9. Account for the passage of this Bill. 10. Describe “Squatter 
Sovereignty” with its fearful results. 11. Explain the fact that free- 
soil men outnumbered slaveholders in all the territories. 12. Men¬ 
tion all the political parties that came into existence in America be¬ 
tween 1790 and 1860. 13. Give the Democratic and Republican 

platforms for the campaign of 1856. 14. What was shown by the 

election? 15. Review the principles of the Missouri Compromise and 
of “Squatter Sovereignty,” and then tell the significance of the Dred 
Scott decision by the Supreme Court. 16. Tell of Abraham Lincoln’s 
early life. 17. What great debates brought him before the public? 18. 
Tell the story of John Brown. 19. Give your opinion of the value of 
his life. 


XL 

1. Trace the steps which led to the formation of another political 
party. 2. Give its name and purpose. 3. Describe the convention in 
which Lincoln was nominated. 4. Why did his election decxae the 
secession of the Southern states? 5. What did secession mean to the 
people of South Carolina? 6. Name the other seceding stages. 7. 
What arguments can you give for or against the theory of secession? 
8. How could President Buchanan have checked this movement for 
secession? 9. What would you have said about it? 10. Give the 
substance of Lincoln’s inaugural message, and show its wisdom. 11. 
Describe the attack on Fort Sumter. 12. Was Lincoln’s prompt call 


QUESTIONS 


xxii 

for volunteers in accord with the principles laid down in his inaugural 
address? 13. Prove that the preserving of the Union, rather than the 
destruction of slavery, moved the North. 14. Explain why the South 
thought that it had an equally great motive for activity. 15. What 
new states were added to the Confederacy? 16. What were the border 
states? 

XLI 

1. Review Chapter XXXIX, and give reasons for the increase in 
the population of the free states. 2. Contrast the resources of the 
South with the resources of the North. 3. Prove that the education 
of the laboring people adds much to the strength of a nation. 4. Make 
a list of the most noted American authors of this era. 5. Tell some¬ 
thing of the value of the telegraph, both to the North and to the South 
at this time. 

XLII 

1. Compare the volunteers in 1861 with the American soldiers of 
1776. 2. Tell something of the military training of the South. 3. 

What were ‘‘legal tender notes”? 4. Explain the national bank sys¬ 
tem. 5. Show how both added to the Northern treasury. 6. Give 
the meaning of a blockade. 7. To what extent was the South depen¬ 
dent on its imports and exports? 8. Describe the work of the English- 
built blockade runners. 9. Explain the mission of Mason and Slidell. 
10.When hadAmerica strongly insisted on the very principle of Inter¬ 
national Law that was broken by the seizure of these men? 11. Why, 
then, were Americans delighted with the news of such an act? 12. 
How was England divided in its opinions of the war? 13. What did 
England’s acknowledgment of the belligerency of the South mean to 
the Confederacy? 14. To the Union? 

XLIII 

1. Show what were the natural lines of defense for the South. 2. 
Give reasons for the cry, “On to Richmond.” 3. Describe the battle 
of Bull Run. 4. How did this defeat bring good results to the North? 

5. Which capital was in the greater danger because of its location? 

6. Tell what you know of the great generals defending Richmond. 7. 
Tell the story of the Merrimac and Monitor. 8. Why did McClellan 
not take Richmond? 9. How did the second battle of Bull Run and 
its results prove the wisdom of Lincoln’s advice to McClellan? 10. 
Tell of the battle of Antietam, and McClellan’s removal. 11. Who 
was responsible for the terrible mistake of Fredericksburg? 12. Had 
the North been out-generaled? 


XLIV 

1. In what form was the war carried on in Missouri and Kentucky? 
2. With what results? 3. How and where did General Grant begin his 
part in the Civil War? 4. Why were Forts Henry and Donelson strate¬ 
gic points? 5. How was their capture accomplished? 6. Describe the 
battle of Shiloh. 7. What qualities were displayed by Grant in this 


QUESTIONS 


xxm 


battle? 8. What did the capture of Memphis mean? 9. What names 
are associated with Grant’s in this Western campaign? 10. How was 
the purpose of the North changed during the first years of the war? 11. 

hy did Lincoln hesitate to abolish slavery? 12. Define the term 
11 contraband of war.” 13. How did the Emancipation Proclamation 
reveal Lincoln’s greatness? 14. Give the steps which preceded its final 
issue on January 1, 1863. 

XLV 

1. Name the three generals who had command of the Army of the 
Potomac before General Meade. 2. Locate the battle fields on which 
they led the Union forces. 3. Give Lee’s purpose in invading Pennsyl¬ 
vania. 4. Tell what you know of the battle of Gettysburg. 5. Why 
is this battle named as one of the great decisive battles in history? 8. 
What events led to the surrender of Vicksburg? 7. Show the impor¬ 
tance of this capture. 8. Locate Chattanooga and Chickamauga. 9. 
Describe the heroic work of General Thomas at Chickamauga. 10. 
What do you know of the four generals who led the Union forces to the 
capture of Chattanooga? 11. Show the work of each in this wonderful 
campaign. 12. Explain the meaning of “drafting.” 13. Why was it 
necessary? 14. How did New York show its opposition to this act of 
Congress? 15. How many lieutenant generals had the American troops 
known before Grant? 16. Describe the terrible scenes which mark the 
steps in Grant’s “hammering campaign” on the way to Richmond. 
17. Compare Grant and Lee, and decide which proved the greater gen¬ 
eral. 18. Imagine the meaning of this campaign to the homes of the 
North and also of the South. 19. Tell the story of Early’s cavalry in 
the Shenandoah Valley. 20. Describe Sheridan’s famous ride. 21. 
Find this described in poetry. 22. Why had the North been unable 
to enforce the blockade of Mobile? 23. How did the work of Sheridan 
and Farragut affect Lee’s army? 24. Give the significance of the fact 
that Confederate war vessels were fitted out in British ports. 25. De¬ 
scribe the battle between the Alabama and the Kearsarge. 26. What 
events were taking place in the West while Grant was moving toward 
Richmond? 27. Give the purpose of Sherman’s march to the sea. 
28. Make a list of facts to prove that this march was one of the most 
wonderful accomplishments of the war. 29. What was General Hood’s 
plan for thwarting Sherman? 30. How did General Thomas prove 
himself master of the situation? 


XLVI 

L Why did Secretary Chase resign his office? 2. What is meant 
by a “war Democrat”? 3. Give the Democratic platform for the elec¬ 
tion of 1864, and compare it with the Republican. 4. Suggest a reason 
for the nomination of McClellan. 5. Why did Sherman’s telegram 
have any influence on Lincoln’s majority? 6. How did Congress, in 
1864, show its approval of President Lincoln? 7. What was Sherman’s 
next’plan after reaching Savannah, and how was it carried out? 8. 
What part had the Union cavalry in forcing Lee to surrender? 9. De¬ 
scribe the final scene of the war. 10. What lesson did Grant seek to 
teach in his hour of victory? 11. Prove that the South suffered far 


XXIV 


QUESTIONS 


more deeply than the North during the war. 12. Show how bravely 
both North and South took up their burden at its close. 

XLVII 

1. How did the South look upon Lincoln’s death? 2. What grave 
question did Congress face after the war? 3. By what wise plan had 
Lincoln sought to answer that question? 4. Show that it was impossible 
for Johnson to act as Lincoln would have acted. 5. What were some 
of the bills vetoed by the President? 6. Give reasons for his quarrel 
with Congress. 7. Give the substance of the fourteenth amendment. 
8. How was it received? 9. Give the Reconstruction Act. 10. Tell 
something of the leaders in this Congress. 11. Show that its acts were 
not at all in accord with Lincoln’s reconstruction policy. 12. Give 
their effect upon the politics of the South. 13. Describe this work of the 
Ku Klux Klan. 14. Tell what you know of an impeachment trial. 
15. Why would the removal of President Johnson from office have 
established a dangerous precedent? 16. Name the great generals who 
have become President, and give their political parties. 17. Explain 
why all the states were willing to sign the fifteenth amendment. 18. 
What do you think of France’s attempt to gain a hold in Mexico during 
the Civil War? 19. What did her prompt withdrawal after the war 
show? 20. Show the importance of the purchase of Alaska. 21. 
What great disputes between the L T nited States and Great Britain were 
settled by the treaty of Washington? 22. How was each decided? 
23. How long was Grant in office, and what are the main facts of his 
administration? 24. Trace the causes of the panic of 1873. 25. What 
other problems demanded the thought of a wise President? 

XLVIII 

1. Give the cause of the disputed election of 1876. 2. How did Hayes 
become President? 3. Under what conditions did the United States 
celebrate its hundredth anniversary? 4. To what uses had electricity 
been put by 1876? 5. By what wise and courageous act did President 
Hayes bring the North and South closer together? 6. For what purpose 
was “greenback” money first issued? 7. What fact gives value to such 
money? 8. How was this proven by Congress? 9. Why is the railway 
strike of 1877 of great significance? 10. Show the danger of the 
“strike.” 11. What party principle elected Garfield? 12. Should the 
President or the Senate choose Cabinet officers? 13. What great civil 
problem did the Garfield-Conlding quarrel bring to the people? 14. 
What important act marks the administration of President Arthur? 15. 
Account for Cleveland’s election. 16. Tell of the Haymarket riot and 
its lesson to the nation. 17. Give the order of the succession of Cabinet 
officers to the Presidency. 


XLIX 

1. What was the Sherman Act? 2. How did it suggest the possibility 
of a serious difficulty? 3. Explain the meaning of the platform adopted 
by the Populists in 1892. 4. Account for Cleveland’s election, in 1892, 
after his defeat of 1888. 5. Explain his position on the Hawaiian 

question. 6 . Was its annexation five years later carried on in a way 


QUESTIONS 


XXV 


suited to American honor? 7. Make a list of the great panics in our 
history. 8. Give their causes, and show in what respects the panic of 
1893 was more serious than the preceding ones. 9. What did the repeal 
of the Sherman Act show? 10. What great lessons were to be drawn 
from these anxious days? 11. Account for the division in the Demo¬ 
cratic party in 1896. 12. Show the importance of the Bryan-McKinley 
campaign. 


L 

1. Tell what you know of the Cuban rebellion. 2. Describe the 
scene in Havana harbor at the time of the destruction of the Maine. 
3. Can you prove that the United States was justified in its action of 
April 19, 1898? 4. Show that the capture of Manila was the greatest 
event of the war. 5. Describe events leading to the destruction of 
Cervera’s fleet. 6. How did the land campaigns in Cuba test the 
courage of the American soldier? 7. Describe the land campaigns of 
this war. 8. Give the terms of the treaty which ended this war. 9. 
Briefly trace the history of Spain in the New World, and show the 
results of Spanish influence still in existence in America. 10. What 
great opportunities were opened to the Americans through the pos¬ 
session of the Philippines? 11. Tell the facts and dates concerning 
the territorial expansion of the United States. 


LI 

1. Tell something of the extent of mines in the Rocky Mountains. 

2. Trace on your map the three great trails to the West. 3. What were 
the dangers peculiar to each of these trails? 4. What fact seems most 
wonderful to you in connection with this mode of traveling? 5. When 
were the great Pacific Railroad lines built? 6. Trace their routes on 
the map, and see how closely they followed the old trails. 7. Show what 
transformations were brought about as a result of these railroads. 8. 
Tell what other nations compare with the United States in the skillful 
making of self-governing states? 9. Name the new states of 1890. 


LII 

1. By a word picture contrast the life of the Vv^estern farmer in the 
olden days with his life to-day. 2. Has the introduction of this won¬ 
derful agricultural machinery made the farmer less or more independent? 

3. Show both the advantage and the disadvantage of the large farm. 

4. Give the steps by which the milling industry has been made to meet 
the demands of the great grain markets of the present day. 5. Trace 
our meat industry from the work of the cow-boy to the great European 
markets. 6. Repeat the story of Hiawatha’s struggle with Mondamin, 
and endeavor to span the step from that to the American corn crop of 
a single year. 7. Show that the introduction of the cotton factory 
brought prosperity to the crippled South. 8. By what means has the 
South become financially independent? 


XXVI 


QUESTIONS 


LIII 

1. Why is this called an age of steel? 2. Show that the number of 
ships on our Great Lakes is a sign of national prosperity. 3. State 
figures to show the immense growth of New York City in the nine¬ 
teenth century. 4. What great problems are found in our cities, and 
how are they being solved? 5. Tell something of the gigantic size to 
which the trust problem has grown. 6. Prove by argument that the 
Government should control the railroads. 7. How, only, may a nation 
become truly great? 


LIV 

1. Tell what you know of Roosevelt’s political career before 1900. 
2. How many of those Vice-Presidents, who had succeeded to the 
Presidency, were afterwards elected to the office? 3. Tell in what ways 
the United States gained in the respect of the Oriental nations during 
Roosevelt’s administration. 4. Make a list of the other great achieve¬ 
ments of his term, and decide which is of the greatest importance. 5. 
Why did the Payne-Aldrich Tariff Bill fail to satisfy the American 
people? 6. What caused the division in the Republican party during 
Taft’s administration? 7. Of what value is the Panama Canal likely 
to be to the American people? 8. Name and discuss the important 
events that have occurred in the administration of Wilson. 9. Prove 
that the United States has bravely faced the truth that with great 
power comes great responsibility. 


LV 

1. Give a brief summary of the great war before the entrance of the 
United States. 2. Describe the attitude of different Americans at the 
outbreak of the war toward England, France and Germany. 3. What 
official position was taken by the United States in 1914? 4. What was 
the trend of public sentiment? Why? 5. Describe England’s blockade 
plan and Germany’s retaliation. 6. In what way did the United States 
become involved? 7. Explain Germany’s violation of international 
law. 8. Discuss the sinking of the Lusitania and its effect. 9. Name 
some of Germany’s many plans for conquering the world. 10. Outline 
German crimes committed on U. S. soil. 11. What arguments were 
used for and against our preparation for war? 12. Who were able to 
see the real issue? What was it? 13. After what action on the part 
of Germany was the German Ambassador sent home? 14. What action 
did Congress take? 15. What was the “last straw”? 16. Give the 
meaning of a “state of war.” 17. Describe the thorough preparations 
carried out by the United States. 18. Picture the raising and transport¬ 
ing of our army. 19. What led to the appointment of an allied com¬ 
mander? 20. Describe Foch’s plan and its operation. 21. Compare 
our share in the victory with that of our brave Allies 


QUESTIONS 


xxvi 1 


LVI 

1. Contrast our national government with that of France. 2. Define 
the relation of national, state, and city government. 3. Study the 
Preamble and find the purposes of establishing the Constitution. 4. 
Give an outline of the general plan of the Constitution. 5. Show by 
illustration the wisdom of having three branches of government. 6. 
How are the members of each house of Congress chosen? 7. Discuss 
the powers of the two houses. 8. Prove that the Speaker of the House 
has greater power than the Vice-President. 9. Why does Congress do 
much of its work through committees? 10. How may a bill become a 
law? 11. Outline the work of the Judicial Department. 12. Give the 
duties of the Executive Department. 13. Name the departments of 
the President’s Cabinet, and the duties of each. 14. What are the two 
great sources of income for the United States? 15. How may a foreigner 
become a citizen of the United States? 16. What advantage is gained 
by securing a copyright or a patent? 17. How are the standards of 
weights and measures fixed? 18. To what department does the Weather 
Bureau belong? 19. What is the work of the Interstate Commerce, 
and the Federal Trade Commissions? 20. Explain the importance of 
Federal Reserve Banks. 21. Why were the first ten Amendments added 
to the Constitution? 22. Discuss each of the other Amendments. 


SUMMARY 

1. Tell how man’s manner of living has changed since the days of the 
colonists in 

(1) Comforts of life in the home as to houses, heating, lighting, 
cooking, water supply, foods, sanitation, transportation by 
land and water, methods of communication, and in other 
ways of which you may think. 

(2) Man’s intellectual life as to schools, colleges, books, papers, 
magazines, inventions, etc. 

(3) Man’s moral life in improvement in our attitude toward the 
suffering of animals, children, unfortunates, other peoples 
(as the Cubans, Filipinos, etc.). 

Do you think this country is better in these three ways than it was 
in 1776? Why? 


THE PRESIDENTS AND VICE PRESIDENTS 


XXviii THE PRESIDENTS AND VICE PRESIDENTS 




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1 George Washington’s election was unanimous. 

2 This is not the same party as the present Republican Party. 












































































































Admitted into the Union Adopted the Constitution 


POPULATION AND AREA OF STATES xxix 

POPULATION AND AREA OF STATES 


ES. 

No. 

Name. 

Area in 
Square 
Miles. 1 

Population 

1910. 

1787 

1 

Delaware. 

1,960 

202,322 

1787 

2 

Pennsylvania. 

44,985 

7,665,111 

1787 

3 

New Jersey. 

7,525 

2,537,167 

1788 

4 

Georgia. 

58,980 

2,609,121 

1788 

5 

Connecticut. 

4,845 

1,114,756 

1788 

6 

Massachusetts. 

8,040 

3,366,416 

1788 

7 

Maryland. 

9,860 

1,295,346 

1788 

8 

South Carolina. 

30,170 

1,515,400 

1788 

9 

New Hampshire. 

9,005 

430,572 

1788 

10 

Virginia. 

40,125 

2,061,612 

1788 

11 

New York. 

47,620 

9,113,614 

1789 

12 

North Carolina. 

48,580 

2,206,287 

1790 

13 

Rhode Island. 

1,053 

542,610 

1791 

14 

Vermont. 

9,135 

355,956 

1792 

15 

Kentucky. 

40,000 

2,289,905 

1796 

16 

Tennessee. 

41,750 

2,184,789 

1803 

17 

Ohio. 

40,760 

4,767,121 

1812 

18 

Louisiana. 

45,420 

1,656,388 

1816 

19 

Indiana. 

35,910 

2,700,876 

1817 

20 

Mississippi. 

46,340 

1,797,114 

1818 

21 

Illinois. 

56,000 

5,638,591 

1819 

22 

Alabama. 

51,540 

2,138,093 

1820 

23 

Maine. 

29,895 

742,371 

1821 

24 

Missouri. 

68,735 

3,293,335 

1836 

25 

Arkansas. 

53,045 

1,574,449 

1837 

26 

Michigan. 

57,430 

2,810,173 

1845 

27 

Florida. 

54,240 

752,619 

1845 

28 

Texas. 

262,290 

3,896,542 

1846 

29 

Iowa. 

55,475 

2,224,7711 

1848 

30 

Wisconsin. 

54,450 

2,333,860 

1850 

31 

California. 

155,980 

2,377,549 

185S 

32 

Minnesota. 

79,205 

2,075,708 

1859 

33 

Oregon. 

94,560 

672,765 

1861 

34 

Kansas. 

81,700 

1,690,949 

1863 

35 

West Virginia. 

24,645 

1,221,119 

1864 

36 

Nevada. 

109,740 

81,875 

1867 

37 

Nebraska. 

76,840 

1,192,214 

1876 

38 

Colorado. 

103,645 

799,024 

1889 

39 

North Dakota. 

70,195 

577,056 

1889 

40 

South Dakota. 

76.850 

583,888 

1889 

41 

Montana. 

145,310 

376,053 

1889 

42 

Washington. 

66,880 

1,141,990 

1890 

43 

Idaho... 

84,290 

325,594 

1890 

44 

Wyoming. 

97,575 

145,965 

1896 

45 

U tah. 

82,190 

373,351 

1907 

46 

Oklahoma. 

69,830 

1,657,155 

1912 

47 

New Mexico. 

122,460 

327,301 

1912 

48 

Arizona. 

112,920 

204,354 


t 


TERRITORIES AND OTHER POLITICAL BODIES 


1791 

District of Columbia. 

60 

331,069 

1868 


590,8S4 

63,592 2 

1900 


6,449 

154,001 * 



3,606 

953,243 3 


Philippines. 

127,853 

6,976,574 3 


i This is for actual area of land, not including water. 

1 The census of 1900. . _ . , , , t . 

« Not the official census of 1900 or 1910, but the official census taken soon after 

annexation. 
















































































XXX POPULATION OF UNITED STATES BY DECADES 


POPULATION OF CONTINENTAL UNITED STATES BY DECADES 


Census. 

Total Population. 

Increase. 

Percentage of 
Increase. 

1790. 

3,929,214 

5,308,483 



1800. 

1,379,269 

35.1 

1810. 

7,239,881 

1,931,398 

36.4 

1820. 

9,638,453 

2,398,572 

33.1 

1830. 

12,866,020 

3,227,567 

33.5 

1840. 

17,069,453 

4,203,433 

32.7 

1850. 

23,191,876 

6,122,423 

35.9 

I860. 

31,443,321 

38,558,371 

8,251,445 

7,115,050 

35.6 

1870. 

22.6 

1880. 

50,155,783 

11,597,412 

30.1 

1890. 

62,947,714 

12,791,931 

25.5 

1900... 

75,994,575 

13,046,861 

20.7 

1910. 

91,972,266 

15,977,691 

21.0 

























THE “MAYFLOWER” COMPACT 


In the name of God, Amen. We whose names are written, the 
loyall subjects of our dread soveraigne Lord, King James, by the 
grace of God, of Great Britaine, Franc, & Ireland, king, defender 
of the faith, &c., haveing undertaken, for the glorie of God, and 
advancemente of the Christian faith, and honour of our king & 
countrie, a voyage to plant the first coionie in the Northerne parts 
of Virginia, doe by these presents solemnly & mutualy in the presence 
of God, and one of another, covenant & combine ourselves togeather 
into a civill body politick, for our better ordering & preservation & 
furtherance of the ends aforesaid: and by vertue hearof to enacte, 
constitute, and frame such just & equall lawes, ordinances, actes, 
constitutions, & offices, from time to time, as shall be thought most 
meete & convenient for the generall good of the Coionie, unto wffiich 
we promise all due submission and obedience. In witnes whereof 
we have hereunder subscribed our names at Cape-Cod the 11, of 
November, in the year of the raigne of our soveraigne lord, King 
James, of England, France & Ireland the 18, and of Scotland the 
fiftie-fourth. Ano. Dom. 1G20. 


xxxi 


THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE 


In Congress, July 4, 1776. 

THE UNANIMOUS DECLARATION OF THE THIRTEEN UNITED STATES OF 

AMERICA 1 

When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for 
one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them 
with another, and to assume, among the powers of the earth, the 
separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of na¬ 
ture’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind 
requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the 
separation. 

We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created 
equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable 
rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happi¬ 
ness. That, to secure these rights, governments are instituted among 
men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; 
that, whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these 
ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to 
institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles, 
and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most 
likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will 
dictate that governments long established, should not De changed for 
light and transient causes; and, accordingly, all experience hath 
shown, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are 
sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which 
they are accustomed. But, when a long train of abuses and usurpa¬ 
tions, pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce 
them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to 
throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their 
future security.—Such has been the patient sufferance of these colo¬ 
nies ; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter 
their former system of government. The history of the present king 
of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all 
having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over 
these States. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world- 

1 The capitals, punctuation, paragraphing, are modern, and not like the original. 

xxxii 



THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE xxxiii 

He has refused his assent to laws the most wholesome and neces¬ 
sary for the public good. 

He has forbidden his governors to pass laws of immediate and 
pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his as¬ 
sent should be obtained; and, when so suspended, he has utterly 
neglected to attend to them. 

He has refused to pass other laws for the accommodation of large 
districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of 
representation in the legislature, a right inestimable to them and 
formidable to tyrants only. 

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, un¬ 
comfortable, and distant from the depository of their public records, 
for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his 
measures. 

He has dissolved representative houses repeatedly, for opposing, 
with manly firmness, his invasions on the rights of the people. 

He has refused, for a long time after such dissolutions, to cause 
others to be elected; whereby the legislative powers, incapable of 
annihilation, have returned to the people at large for their exercise; 
the State remaining, in the meantime, exposed to all the dangers of 
invasion from without, and convulsions within. 

He has endeavored to prevent the population of these States; for 
that purpose obstructing the laws for naturalization of foreigners; 
refusing to pass others to encourage their migration hither, and rais¬ 
ing the conditions of new appropriations of lands. 

He has obstructed the administration of justice, by refusing his 
assent to laws for establishing judiciary powers. 

He has made judges dependent on his will alone for the tenure 
of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries. 

He has erected a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms 
of officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance. 

He has kept among us in times of peace, standing armies, without 
the consent of our legislature. 

He has affected to render the military independent of, and su¬ 
perior to, the civil pow 7 er. 

He has combined, with others, to subject us to a jurisdiction for¬ 
eign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his 
assent to their acts of pretended legislation: 

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us: 

For protecting them, by a mock trial, from punishment for any 
murders w T hich they should commit on the inhabitants of these States' 

For cutting off our trade with all parts of the world: 

For imposing taxes on us without our consent: 

For depriving us, in many cases, of the benefits of trial by jury! 

For transporting us beyond seas to be tried for pretended offenses: 

For abolishing the free system of English laws in a neighboring 
province, establishing therein an arbitrary government and enlarging 


XXxiv THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE 


its boundaries, so as to render it at once an example and fit instru* 
ment for introducing the same absolute rule into these colonies: 

For taking away our charters, abolishing our most valuable laws, 
and altering, fundamentally, the forms of our governments: 

For suspending our own legislatures, and declaring themselves 
invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever. 

He has abdicated government here by declaring us out of his 
protection, and waging war against us. 

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, 
and destroyed the lives of our people. 

He is, at this time, transporting large armies of foreign mer¬ 
cenaries to complete the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, 
already begun, with circumstances of cruelty and perfidy scarcely 
paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the head 
of a civilized nation. 

He has constrained our fellow-citizens, taken captive on the high 
seas, to bear arms against their country, to become the executioners 
of their friends and brethren, or to fall themselves by their hands. 

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has en* 
deavored to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless 
Indian savages, whose known rule of warfare is an undistinguished 
destruction of all ages, sexes, and conditions. 

In every stage of these oppressions, we have petitioned for redress 
in the most humble terms: our repeated petitions have been answered 
only by repeated injury. A prince, whose character is thus marked 
by every act which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a 
free people. 

Nor have we been wanting in attention to our British brethren. 
We have warned them, from time to time, of attempts by their leg¬ 
islature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have 
reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement 
here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and 
we have conjured them, ny the ties of our common kindred, to disavow 
these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections 
and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice 
and consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity 
which denounces our separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest 
of mankind, enemies in war, in peace, friends. 

We, therefore, the representatives of the United States of America, 
in general Congress assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of 
the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the name, and 
by authority of the good people of these colonies, solemnly publish 
and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of right ought to 
be, free and independent States; that they are absolved from all 
allegiance to the British crown, and that all political connection 
between them and the state of Great Britain is, and ought to be, 
totally dissolved; and that, as free and independent States, they 


THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE XXXV 


have full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, 
establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which inde¬ 
pendent States may of right do. And for the support of this 
declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Provi¬ 
dence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and 


our sacred honor. 

The foregoing declaration was, by order 
and signed by the following members. 


New Hampshire 

Josiah Bartlett, 

Wm. Whipple, 
Matthew Thornton. 

Massachusetts Bay 

Sami. Adams, 

John Adams, 

Robt. Treat Paine, 
Elbridge Gerry. 

Rhode Island 

Step. Hopkins, 
William Ellery. 

Connecticut 

Roger Sherman, 
Sam’el Huntington, 
Wm. Williams, 
Oliver Wolcott. 

New York 

Wm. Floyd, 

Phil. Livingston, 
Frans. Lewis, 

Lewis Morris. 


New Jersey 

Richd. Stockton, 
Jno. Witherspoon, 
Eras. Hopkinson, 
John Hart, 

Abra. Clark. 

Pennsylvania 

Robt. Morris, 
Benjamin Rush, 
Benja. Franklin, 
John Morton, 
Geo. Clymer, 

Jas. Smith, 

Geo. Taylor, 
James Wilson, 
Geo. Ross. 

Delaware 

Caesar Rodney, 
Geo. Read, 

Tho. M’Kean. 

Maryland 

Samuel Chase, 
Wm. Paca, 

Thos. Stone, 


John Hancock. 
of Congress, engrossed 

Charles Carroll of Car¬ 
rollton. 

Virginia 

George Wythe, 

Richard Henry Lee, 
Th Jefferson, 

Benja. Harrison, 

Thos. Nelson, jr., 
Francis Lightfoot Lee, 
Carter Braxton. 

North Carolina 

Wm. Hooper, 

Joseph IIewes, 

John Penn. 

South Carolina 

Edward Rutledge, 

Thos. Heyward, Junr., 
Thomas Lynch, Junr.„ 
Arthur Middleton. 

Georgia 

Button Gwinnett, 
Lyman Hall, 

Geo. Walton. 


CONSTITUTION 


OF THE 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 


[Preamble] 

We, the people or the United States, in order to form a more 
perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, pro¬ 
vide for the common defence, promote the general welfare, and 
secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do 
ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of 
America. 


ARTICLE I 
[Legislative Department] 

Sect. 1. All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in 
a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and 
a House of Representatives. 

Sect. 2. The House of Representatives shall be composed of 
members chosen every second year by the people of the several 
States, and the electors in each State shall have the qualifications 
requisite for electors of the most numerous branch of the State 
Legislature. 

No person shall be a Representative who shall not have attained 
to the age of twenty-five years, and been seven years a citizen of 
the United States, and who shall not, when elected, be an inhab¬ 
itant of that State in which he shall be chosen. 

Representatives and direct taxes shall be apportioned among the 
several States which may be included within this Union, according 
to their respective numbers, which shall be determined by adding 
to the whole number of free persons, including those bound to serv¬ 
ice for a term of years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths 
of all other persons. The actual enumeration shall be made within 
three years after the first meeting of the Congress of the United 
States, and within every subsequent term of ten years, in such man¬ 
ner as they shall by law direct. The number of Representatives shali 


xxxvi 




CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES XXXV11 


not exceed one for every thirty thousand, but each State shall have 
at least one representative; and until such enumeration shall be 
made, the State of New Hampshire shall be entitled to choose three, 
Massachusetts eight, Rhode Island and Providence Plantations one, 
Connecticut five, New York six, New Jersey four, Pennsylvania 
eight, Delaware one, Maryland six, Virginia ten, North Carolina five, 
South Carolina five, and Georgia three. 

When vacancies happen in the representation from any State, 
the Executive authority thereof shall issue writs of election to fill 
such vacancies. 

The House of Representatives shall choose their Speaker and 
other officers; and shall have the sole power of impeachment. 

Sect. 3. The Senate of the United States shall be composed of 
two Senators from each State, chosen by the Legislature thereof, 
for six years; and each Senator shall have one vote. 

Immediately after they shall be assembled in consequence of the 
first election, they shall be divided as equally as may be into three 
classes. The seats of the Senators of the first class shall be vacated 
at the expiration of the second year, of the second class at the ex¬ 
piration of the fourth year, and of the third class at the expiration of 
the sixth year so that one third may be chosen every second year; 
and if vacancies happen by resignation, or otherwise, during the 
recess of the Legislature of any State, the Executive thereof may 
make temporary appointments until the next meeting of the Legis¬ 
lature, which shall then fill such vacancies. 

No person shall be a Senator who shall not have attained to the 
age of thirty years, and been nine years a citizen of the United 
States, and who shall not, when elected, be an inhabitant of that 
State for which he shall be chosen. 

The Vice President of the United States shall be President of 
the Senate, but shall have no vote, unless they be equally divided. 

The Senate shall choose their other officers, and also a president 
pro tempore, in the absence of the Vice President, or when he shall 
exercise the office of President of the United States. 

The Senate shall have the sole power to try all impeachments. 
When sitting for that purpose, they shall be on oath or affirmation. 
When the President of the United States is tried, the Chief Justice 
shall preside and no person shall be convicted without the concur¬ 
rence of two thirds of the members present. 

Judgment in cases of impeachment shall not extend further than 
to removal from office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any 
office of honor, trust, or profit under the United States: but the 
party convicted shall nevertheless be liable and subject to indict¬ 
ment, trial, judgment, and punishment, according to law. 

Sect. 4. The times, places, and manner of holding elections for 
Senators and Representatives shall be prescribed in each State by 
the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by law 


XXXviii CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES 

make or alter such regulations, except as to the places of choosing 
Senators. 

The Congress shall assemble at least once in every year, and such 
meeting shall be on the first Monday in December, unless they shall 
by law appoint a different day. 

Sect. 5. Each House shall be the judge of the elections, returns, 
and qualifications of its own members, and a majority of each shall 
constitute a quorum to do business; but a smaller number may ad¬ 
journ from day to day, and may be authorized to compel the attend¬ 
ance of absent members in such manner, and under such penalties, 
as each House may provide. 

Each House may determine the rules of its proceedings, punish 
its members for disorderly behavior, and, with the concurrence of 
two thirds, expel a member. 

Each House shall keep a journal of its proceedings, and from 
time to time publish the same, excepting such parts as may in their 
judgment require secrecy ; and the yeas and nays of the members of 
either House on any question shall, at the desire of one fifth of those 
present, be entered on the journal. 

Neither House, during the session of Congress, shall, without 
the consent of the other, adjourn for more than three days, nor to 
any other place than that in which the two Houses shall be sitting. 

Sect. G. The Senators and Representatives shall receive a com¬ 
pensation for their services, to be ascertained by law, and paid out 
of the Treasury of the United States. They shall in all cases, ex¬ 
cept treason, felony, and breach of the peace, be privileged from 
arrest during their attendance at the session of their respective 
Houses, and in going to and returning from the same; and for any 
speech or debate in either House they shall not be questioned in any 
other place. 

No Senator or Representative shall, during the time for which 
he was elected, be appointed to any civil office under the authority 
of the United States, which shall have been created, or the emolu¬ 
ments whereof shall have been increased, during such time; and no 
person holding any office under the United States shall be a member 
of either House during his continuance in office. 

Sect. 7. All bills for raising revenue shall originate in the House 
of Representatives; but the Senate may propose or concur with 
amendments as on other bills. 

Every bill which shall have passed the House of Representatives 
and the Senate shall, before it becomes a law, be presented to the 
President of the United States; if he approve he shall sign it, but 
if not he shall return it with his objections to that House in which 
it shall have originated, who shall enter the objections at large on 
their journal, and proceed to reconsider it. If after such recon¬ 
sideration two thirds of that House shall agree to pass the bill, it 
shall be sent, together with the objections, to the other House, by 


CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES xxxix 


which it shall likewise be reconsidered, and, if approved by two 
thirds of that House, it shall become a law. But in all such cases 
the votes of both Houses shall be determined by yeas and nays, and 
the names of the persons voting for and against the bill shall be en¬ 
tered on the journal of each House respectively. If any bill shall 
not be returned by the President within ten days (Sundays excepted) 
after it shall have been presented to him, the same shall be a law, 
in like manner as if he had signed it, unless the Congress by their 
adjournment prevent its return, in which case it shall not be a law. 

Every order, resolution, or vote to -which the concurrence of the 
Senate and House of Representatives may be necessary (except on 
a question of adjournment) shall be presented to the President of the 
United States; and, before the same shall take effect, shall be ap¬ 
proved by him, or, being disapproved by him, shall be repassed by 
two thirds of the Senate and House of Representatives, according 
to the rules and limitations prescribed in the case of a bill. 

Sect. 8. The Congress shall have power,— 

To lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises to pay the 
debts and provide for the common defence and general welfare of 
the United Stages ; but all duties, imposts, and excises shall be uni¬ 
form throughout the United States; 

To borrow money on the credit of the United States; 

To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the sev¬ 
eral States, and with the Indian tribes; 

To establish an uniform rule of naturalization, and uniform laws 
on the subject of bankruptcies throughout the United States ; 

To coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, 
and fix the standard of weights and measures; 

To provide for the punishment of counterfeiting the securities 
and current coin of the United States; 

To establish post-offices and post-roads; 

To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing 
for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their 
respective writings and discoveries; 

To constitute tribunals inferior to the Supreme Court; 

To define and punish piracies and felonies committed on the high 
seas, and offences against the law of nations; 

To declare war, grant letters of marque and reprisal, and make 
rules concerning captures on land and water; 

To raise and support armies, but no appropriation of money to 
that use shall be for a longer term than two years; 

To provide and maintain a navy; 

To make rules for the government and regulation of the land and 
naval forces; 

To provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the 
Union, suppress insurrections, and repel invasions; 

To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining the militia, 

34 


xl 


CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES 


and for governing such part of them as may be employed in the 
service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the 
appointment of the officers, and the authority of training the militia 
according to the discipline prescribed by Congress; 

To exercise exclusive legislation, in all cases whatsoever, over such 
district (not exceeding ten miles square) as may, by cession of par¬ 
ticular States, and the acceptance of Congress, become the seat of 
the government of the United States; and to exercise like authority 
over all places purchased by the consent of the Legislature of the 
State in which the same shall be, for the erection of forts, magazines, 
arsenals, dock-yards, and other needful buildings;—and 

To make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carry¬ 
ing into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested 
by this Constitution in the government of the United States, or in 
any department or officer thereof. 

Sect. 9. The migration or importation of such persons as any 
of the States now existing shall think proper to admit, shall not be 
prohibited by the Congress prior to the year one thousand eight 
hundred and eight, but a tax or duty may be imposed on such im¬ 
portation, not exceeding ten dollars for each person. 

The privilege of the writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended, 
unless when in cases of rebellion or invasion the public safety may 
require it. 

No bill of attainder or ex post facto law shall be passed. 

No capitation or other direct tax shall be laid, unless in pro¬ 
portion to the census or enumeration herein before directed to be 
taken. 

No tax or duty shall be laid on articles exported from any State. 

No preference shall be given by any regulation of commerce or 
revenue to the ports of one State over those of another; nor shall 
vessels bound to, or from, one State, be obliged to enter, clear, or 
pay duties in another. 

No money shall be drawn from the treasury, but in consequence 
of appropriations made by law; and a regular statement and account 
of the receipts and expenditures of all public money shall be pub¬ 
lished from time to time. 

No title of nobility shall be granted by the United States ; and 
no person holding any office of profit or trust under them shall, 
without the consent of the Congress, accept of any present, emolu¬ 
ment, ofiice, or title, of any kind whatever, from any king, prince, 
or foreign state. 

Sect. 10. No State shall enter into any treaty, alliance, or con¬ 
federation ; grant letters of marque and reprisal; coin money ; emit 
bills of credit; make anything but gold and silver coin a tender in 
payment of debts; pass any bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or 
law impairing the obligation of contracts, or grant any title of 
nobility. 


CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES xli 

No State shall, without the consent of the Congress, lay any im¬ 
posts or duties on imports or exports, except what may be absolutely 
necessary for executing its inspection laws; and the net produce of 
all duties and imposts, laid by any State on imports or exports, shall 
be for the use of the treasury of the United States; and all such laws 
shall be subject to the revision and control of the Congress. 

No State shall, without the consent of Congress, lay any duty of 
tonnage, keep troops or ships of war in time of peace, enter into any 
agreement or compact with another State, or with a foreign power, 
or engage in war, unless actually invaded, or in such imminent dan¬ 
ger as will not admit of delay. 


ARTICLE II 

\The Executive Department ] 

Sect. 1. The executive power shall be vested in a President of 
the United States of America. He shall hold his office during the 
term of four years, and, together with the Vice President, chosen 
for the same term, be elected as follows:— 

Each State shall appoint, in such manner as the Legislature 
thereof may direct, a number of Electors equal to the whole number 
of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled 
in the Congress : but no Senator or Representative, or person hold¬ 
ing an office of trust or profit under the United States, shall be 
appointed an Elector. 

[The Electors shall meet in their respective States, and vote by 
ballot for two persons, of whom one at least shall not be an inhabi¬ 
tant of the same State with themselves. And they shall make a list 
of all the persons voted for, and of the number of votes for each ; 
which list they shall sign and certify, and transmit sealed to the 
seat of the government of the United States, directed to the Presi¬ 
dent of the Senate. The President of the Senate shall, in the pres¬ 
ence of the Senate and House of Representatives, open all the certifi¬ 
cates, and the votes shall then be counted. The person having the 
greatest number of votes shall be the President, if such number be a 
majority of the whole number of Electors appointed; and if there 
be more than one who have such majority, and have an equal num¬ 
ber of rotes, then the House of Representatives shall immediately 
choose by ballot one of them for President; and if no person have 
a majority, then from the five highest on the list the said House 
shall in like manner choose the President. But in choosing the 
President, the votes shall be taken by States, the representation from 
each State having one vote; a quorum for this purpose shall consist 
of a member or members from two thirds of the States, and a 
majority of all the States shall be necessary to a choice. In every 
CEse, after the choice of the President, the person having the greatest 


xlii 


CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES 


number of votes of the Electors shall be the Vice President. But if 
there should remain two or more who have equal votes, the Senate 
shall choose from them by ballot the Vice President .—Repealed by 
Amendment XII.] 

Congress may determine the time of choosing the Electors, and 
the day on which they shall give their votes; which day shall be 
the same throughout the United States. 

No person except a natural-born citizen, or a citizen of the 
United States at the time of the adoption of this Constitution, shall 
be eligible to the office of President; neither shall any person be 
eligible to that office who shall not have attained to the age of 
thirty-five years, and been fourteen years a resident within the 
United States. 

In case of the removal of the President from office, or of his 
death, resignation, or inability to discharge the powers and duties 
of the said office, the same shall devolve on the Vice President, and 
the Congress may by law provide for the case of removal, death, 
resignation, or inability, both of the President and Vice President, 
declaring what officer shall then act as President, and such officer 
shall act accordingly, until the disability be removed, or a President 
shall be elected. 

The President shall at stated times, receive for his services a 
compensation, which shall neither be increased nor diminished during 
the period for which he shall have been elected, and he shall not 
receive within that period any other emolument from the United 
►States, or any of them. 

Before he enter on the execution of his office, he shall take the 
following oath or affirmation:—“I do solemnly swear (or affirm) 
that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United 
States, and will, to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and 
defend the Constitution of the United States.” 

Sect. 2. The President shall be commander-in-chief of the army 
and navy of the United States, and of the militia of the several 
States, when called into the actual service of the United States; he 
may require the opinion, in writing, of the principal officer in each 
of the executive departments, upon any subject relating to the duties 
of their respective offices, and he shall have power to grant reprieves 
and pardons for offences against the United States, except in cases 
of impeachment. 

He shall have pov er, by and with the advice and consent of the 
Senate, to make treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present 
concur; and he shall nominate, and, by and with the advice and 
consent of the Senate, shall appoint ambassadors, other public min¬ 
isters, and consuls, judges of the Supreme Court, and all other officers 
of the United States, whose appointments are not herein otherwise 
provided for, and which shall be established by law; but the Con¬ 
gress may by law vest the appointment of such inferior officers, as 


CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES xlili 

they think proper, in the President alone, in the courts of law, or in 
the heads of departments. 

The President shall have power to fill up all vacancies that may 
happen during the recess of the Senate, by granting commissions 
which shall expire at the end of their next session. 

Sect. 3. He shall from time to time give to the Congress in¬ 
formation of the state of the Union, and recommend to their consid¬ 
eration such measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient; he 
may, on extraordinary occasions, convene both Houses, or either of 
them, and in case of disagreement between them, with respect to 
the time of adjournment, he may adjourn them to such time as he 
shall think proper; he shall receive ambassadors and other public 
ministers; he shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed, 
and shall commission all the officers of the United States. 

Sect. 4. The President, Vice President, and all civil officers of 
the United States, shall be removed from office on impeachment for, 
and conviction of, treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misde¬ 
meanors. 


ARTICLE III 
\The Judicial Department ] 

Sect. 1. The judicial power of the United States shall be vested 
in one Supreme Court, and in such inferior courts as the Congress 
may from time to time ordain and establish. The judges, both of 
the Supreme and inferior courts, shall hold their offices during good 
behavior, and shall, at stated times, receive for their services a com¬ 
pensation, which shall not be diminished during their continuance 
in office. 

Sect. 2. The judicial power shall extend to all cases, in law 
and equity, arising under this Constitution, the laws of the United 
States, and treaties made, or which shall be made, under their au¬ 
thority ; to all cases affecting ambassadors, other public ministers, 
and consuls; to all cases of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction ; to 
controversies to which the United States shall be a party; to 
controversies between two or more States, between a State and citi¬ 
zens of another State, between citizens of different States, between 
citizens of the same State claiming lands under grants of different 
States, and between a State, or the citizens thereof, and foreign 
states, citizens, or subjects. 

In all cases affecting ambassadors, other public ministers, and 
consuls, and those in which a State shall be party, the Supreme 
Court shall have original jurisdiction. In all the other cases before 
mentioned, the Supreme Court shall have appellate jurisdiction, both 
as to law and fact, with such exceptions, and under such regulations, 
as the Congress shall make. 

The trial of all crimes, except in cases of impeachment, shall be 


xliv CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES 


by jury; and such trial shall be held in the State where the said 
crimes shall have been committed; but when not committed within 
any State, the trial shall be at such place or places as the Congress 
may by law have directed. 

Sect. 3. Treason against the United States shall consist only in 
levying war against them, or in adhering to their enemies, giving 
them aid and comfort. No person shall be convicted of treason 
unless on the testimony of two witnesses to the same overt act, or 
on confession in open court. 

The Congress shall have power to declare the punishment of 
treason, but no attainder of treason shall work corruption of blood, 
or forfeiture except during the life of the person attainted. 


ARTICLE IV 

[Relation of the States to the Federal Government] 

Sect. 1. Full faith and credit shall be given in each State to the 
public acts, records, and judicial proceedings of every other State. 
And the Congress may by general laws prescribe the manner in 
which such acts, records, and proceedings shall be proved, and the 
effect thereof. 

Sect. 2. The citizens of each State shall be entitled to all privi¬ 
leges and immunities of citizens in the several States. 

A person charged in any State with treason, felony, or other 
crime, who shall flee from justice, and be found in another State, 
shall, on demand of the executive authority of the State from which 
he fled, be delivered up, to be removed to the State having juris¬ 
diction of the crime. • 

No person held to service or labor in one State, under the laws 
thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or 
regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor, but 
shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service or 
labor may be due. 

Sect. 3. New States may be admitted by the Congress into this 
Union; but no new State shall be formed or erected within the 
jurisdiction of any other State; nor any State be formed by the 
junction of two or more States, or parts of States, without the con¬ 
sent of the Legislatures of the States concerned, as well as of the 
Congress. 

The Congress shall have power to dispose of and make all needful 
rules and regulations respecting the territory or other property be¬ 
longing to the United States; and nothing in this Constitution shall 
be so construed as to prejudice any claims of the United States, or 
of any particular State. 

Sect. 4. The United States shall guarantee to every State in 
this Union a republican form of government, and shall protect each 


CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES xlv 


of them against invasion ; and on application of the Legislature, or 
of the Executive (when the Legislature can not be convened), against 
domestic violence. 


ARTICLE Y 

[How the Constitution May he Amended] 

The Congress, whenever two thirds of both houses shall deem it 
necessary, shall propose amendments to this Constitution, or, on the 
application of the Legislatures of two thirds of the several States, 
shall call a convention for proposing amendments, which, in either 
case, shall be valid to all intents and purposes, as part of this Con¬ 
stitution, when ratified by the Legislatures of three fourths of the 
several States, or by conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one 
or the other mode of ratification may be proposed by the Congress; 
provided that no amendment which may be made prior to the year 
one thousand eight hundred and eight shall in any manner affect 
the first and fourth clauses in the ninth section of the first article; 
and that no State, without its consent, shall be deprived of its equal 
suffrage in the Senate. 


ARTICLE YI 

[Public Debts; Constitution, the Law of the Land; Oath of Office] 

All debts contracted and engagements entered into, before the 
adoption of this Constitution shall be as valid against the United 
States under this Constitution as under the Confederation. 

This Constitution, and the laws of the United States which shall 
be made in pursuance thereof, and all treaties made, or which shall 
be made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the 
supreme law of the land; and the judges in every State shall be 
bound thereby, anything in the constitution or laws of any State to 
the contrary notwithstanding. 

The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the 
members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and 
judicial officers, both of the United States and of the several States, 
shall be bound by oath or affirmation to support this Constitution ; 
but no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any 
office or public trust under the United States. 


ARTICLE YII 

[How the Constitution Shall be Ratified and Set Up] 

The ratification of the conventions of nine States shall be suffi¬ 
cient for the establishment of this Constitution between the States so 
ratifying the same. 


xlvi CONSTITUTION 01' THE UNITED STATES 


Done in Convention, by the unanimous consent of the States 
present, the seventeenth day of September, in the year of our 
Lord one thousand seven hundred and eighty-seven, and of 
the Independence of the United States of America the twelfth. 
In Witness whereof we have hereunto subscribed our names. 
[Signed by] Go : Washington, 

Presidt. and Deputy from Virginia, 
and by thirty-nine delegates. 


AMENDMENTS 


ARTICLE I 

[Freedom of Speech and Religion, and to Assemble ] 

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of re¬ 
ligion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the 
freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people peace¬ 
ably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of 
grievances. 


ARTICLE II 
[The Right to Bear Arms] 

A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free 
state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be 
infringed. 


ARTICLE III 

[Quartering of Troops] 

% 

No soldier shall, in time of peace, be quartered in any house, 
without the consent of the owner, nor in time of war, but in a man¬ 
ner to be prescribed by law. 


ARTICLE IV 

[Sacrcdness of the Home Secured] 

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, 
papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall 
not be violated, and no warrants shall issue but upon probable cause, 
supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the 
place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized. 



CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES xlvil 


ARTICLE V 
[Right of Trial by Jury ] 

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise in¬ 
famous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, 
except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, 
when in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor shall 
any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy 
of life and limb ; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a 
witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, 
without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for 
public use without just compensation. 


ARTICLE VI 

[Criminal Cases and the Rights of the Accused ] 

In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to 
a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and dis¬ 
trict wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district 
shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of 
the nature and cause of the accusation ; to be confronted with the 
witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining 
witnesses in his favor, and to have the assistance of counsel for his 
defence. 

ARTICLE VII 

[The Jury in Suits at Common Law ] 

In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall 
exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, 
and no fact tried by a jury shall be otherwise re-examined in any 
court of the United States, than according to the rules of the com¬ 
mon law. 

ARTICLE VIII 
[Bail, Fines, and Punishments ] 

Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, 
nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted. 


ARTICLE IX 

[Rights Retained by the People ] 

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not 
be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people. 


xlviii CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES 

ARTICLE X 
[Rights Reserved to States ] 

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitu¬ 
tion, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States 
respectively, or to the people. 


ARTICLE XI 

[Limitation of Federal Court's Power ] 

The judicial power of the United States shall not be construed 
to extend to any suit in law or equity, commenced or prosecuted 
against one of the United States by citizens of another State, or by 
citizens or subjects of any foreign state. 


ARTICLE XII 

[Revision of Electoral Law ] 

The Electors shall meet in their respective States, and vote by 
ballot for President and Vice President, one of whom, at least, shall 
not be an inhabitant of the same State with themselves; they shall 
name in their ballots the person voted for as President, and in dis¬ 
tinct ballots the person voted for as Vice President; and they shall 
make distinct lists of all persons voted for as President, and of all 
persons voted for as Vice President, and of the number of votes for 
each, which lists they shall sign and certify, and transmit sealed to 
the seat of the government of the United States, directed to the 
President of the Senate;—the President of the Senate shall, in the 
presence of the Senate and House of Representatives, open all the 
certificates, and the votes shall then be counted ;—the person having 
the greatest number of votes for President shall be the President, if 
such number be a majority of the whole number of Electors ap¬ 
pointed ; and if no person have such majority, then from the per¬ 
sons having the highest numbers not exceeding three on the list of 
those voted for as President, the House of Representatives shall 
choose immediately, by ballot, the President. But in choosing the 
President, the votes shall be taken by States, the representation from 
each State having one vote; a quorum for this purpose shall consist 
of a member or members from two thirds of the States, and a 
majority of all the States shall be necessary to a choice. And if the 
House of Representatives shall not choose a President, whenever the 
right of choice shall devolve upon them, before the fourth day of 
March next following, then the Vice President shall act as President, 
as in the case of the death or other constitutional disability of the 


CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES xlix 

President. The person having the greatest number of votes as Vice 
President shall be the A ice President, if such number be a majority 
of the whole number of Electors appointed, and if no person have a 
majority, then from the two highest numbers on the list the Senate 
shall choose the \ ice President; a quorum for the purpose shall 
consist of two thirds of the whole number of Senators, and a ma¬ 
jority of the whole number shall be necessary to a choice. But no 
person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be 
eligible to that of Vice President of the United States. 


ARTICLE XIII 
[Slavery Prohibited ] 

Sect. 1 . Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a 
punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly con¬ 
victed, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to 
their jurisdiction. 

Sect. 2. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by ap¬ 
propriate legislation. 


ARTICLE XIV 
[Definition of Citizenship ] 

Sect. 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States, 
and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United 
States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make 
or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities 
of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any 
person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor 
deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of 
the laws. 

[Apportionment of Representatives ] 

Sect. 2. Representatives shall be apportioned among the several 
States according to their respective numbers, counting the whole 
number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed. But 
when the right to vote at any election for the choice of Electors for 
President and Vice President of the United States, Representatives 
in Congress, the executive and judicial officers of a State, or the 
members of the Legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male 
inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of age and citi¬ 
zens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for 
participation in rebellion or other crime, the basis of representation 
therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such 
male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty- 
one years of age in such State. 


1 


CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES 


[Disabilities of Certain Secessionists ] 

Sect. 3. No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Con¬ 
gress, or Elector of President and Vice President, or hold any office, 
civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, 
having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an 
officer of the United States, or as a member of any State Legislature, 
or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the 
Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection 
or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies 
thereof. But Congress may, by a vote of two thirds of each House, 
remove such disability. 

[The Union and Confederate Debts ] 

Sect. 4. The validity of the public debt of the United States, 
authorized by lav-,, including debts incurred for payment of pensions 
and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, 
shall not be questioned. But neither the United States, nor any State 
shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insur¬ 
rection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the 
loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations, 
and claims shall be held illegal and void. 

Sect. 5. The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appro¬ 
priate legislation, the provisions of this article. 


ARTICLE XV 
[Right of Suffrage] 

Sect. 1. The right of citizens of the United State to vote shall 
not be denied or abridged by the United States, or by any State, on 
account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude. 

Sect. 2. The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by 
appropriate legislation. 


ARTICLE XVI 

[Income Tax ] 

The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from 
whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, 
and without regard to any census or enumeration. 


CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES 


li 


ARTICLE XVII • 

[Direct Election of Senators) 

The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from 
each State, elected by the people thereof, for six years; and each Senator 
shall have one vote. The Electors in each State shall have the qualifications 
requisite for Electors of the most numerous branch of the State legislatures. 

When vacancies happen in the representation of any State in the Senate, 
the executive authority of such State shall issue writs of election to fill such 
vacancies: Provided , That the legislature of any State may empower the 
executive thereof to make temporary appointments until the people fill the 
vacancies by election as the legislature may direct. 

This amendment shall not be construed as to effect the election or term 
of any Senator chosen before it becomes valid as part of the Constitution. 


ARTICLE XVIII 

[Prohibition\ 

Sect. 1. After one year from the ratification of this article the man¬ 
ufacture, sale or transportation of intoxicating liquors within, the importation 
thereof into, or the exportation thereof from the United States and all terri¬ 
tories subject to the jurisdiction thereof for beverage purposes is hereby pro¬ 
hibited. 

Sect. 2. The Congress and the several States shall have concurrent 
power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation. 


















INDEX 


Abolitionists, 318, 319, 332, 342, 349. 

Abraham, Plains of, 121. 

Acadia (ah-ka-de-ah), settled, 30; 
ceded to England, 114. 

Adams, Charles Francis, 329, 361, 
381. 

Adams, John, 147 (note), 150, 163, 
165, 166, 193, 231; President, 243- 
247. 

Adams, John Quincy, 269, 282, 284; 
President, 285, 288; and anti¬ 
slavery petitions, 320. 

Adams, Samuel, 145, 146, 147, 150, 
153, 163. 

Agriculture, in colonial times, 128; 
in 1790, 223; modern, on great 
Western farms, 429-436; govern¬ 
mental aid for development of 
scientific, 443. 

Alabama, admitted as a state, 273; 
secedes from Union, 348. 

Alabama, vessel, 381; claims, 399. 

Alamo (ah-lah-mo), 321. 

Alaska, purchase of, 399; coal lands 
in, 453 (note). 

Albany, settled, 76; in Revolution, 
172. 

Albany Congress, 117, 118. 

Aldrich, Senator, 452, 454. 

Alexander VI, Pope, 28. 

Algonquins (al-gon-kins), 112 (note). 

Alien and Sedition laws, 245. 

Allen, Ethan, 157 

Alliance, Treaty of, with French, 
177. 

Alsace-Lorraine, 483. 

Amendments to Constitution, 502, 
503; first ten, 221, 222 (note); 
12th, 254; 13th, 386; 14th, 393, 
394; 15th, 398; text of, Appendix, 
xlvi-li. 


America, discovered, 9, 11; named, 
14; and Europe, 195. 

America’s big task; making an 
Army; establishment of officers’ 
training camps; Selective Con- 
scriptive Act passed in May, 1917; 
immense task of providing arms 
and ammunition, food, clothing, 
ships, etc., for our men, 475-476. 

American and Allied armies move 
to Rhine, 481. 

American and Allied victory over 
Germany, 481. 

American Desert, Great, 428. 

American dialect, 122, 123. 

American Party, 339. 

American Republics, Bureau of, 
established, 462. 

American troops cross ocean in large 
numbers in Spring of 1918, 478. 

Amherst, General, 119, 120, 121. 

Amsterdam, Fort, founded, 76. 

Anarchists, in Chicago, 410. 

Anderson, Major, 350, 351. 

Andre (an-dray), Major, 187. 

Andros, Sir Edmund, 107. 

Annapolis (Md.), convention, 216. 

Annapolis (N. S.), Port Royal be¬ 
comes, 114 (note). 

Antietam, battle of, 366. 

Anti-slavery, movement, 315, 316; 
literature, 318; arguments, 318, 
319; sentiment grows, 371. 

Anti-Trust cases, 453. 

Aquidneck (a-kwid-nek), island of, 
69. 

Arbitration, international, 448 (note). 

Archbold scandal, 454. 

Area of the United States in 1789 and 
1830, 291 (note); Appendix, xxix. 


liii 



liv 


INDEX 


Ark, vessel, 91. 

Arkansas, 325; joins Confederacy, 
352. 

Arlington, Lord, 105. 

Armada (ahr-mah-dah), Spanish, 39. 

Armistice, Germans ask for and 
Allies lay down terms on Novem¬ 
ber 11, 1918, 481. 

Army, Continental, 154, 155; in 
Civil War, 357, 358; in Cuba, 419, 
420. 

Army of Potomac, 363, 366, 374. 

Arnold, Benedict, in Canada, 161; 
on Lake Champlain, 169, 170; at 
Fort Stanwix, 173, 174; at Sara¬ 
toga, 174, 175; treason of, 187, 
188. 

Aroostock (a-roos-took) War, 311. 

Arthur, Chester A., President, 409. 

Articles of Association, 151. 

Articles of Confederation, 167, 211, 
212, 213. 

Assistants, in Massachusetts colony 
government, 63. 

Assumption of state debts, 235. 

Astor, John Jacob, 252. 

Astrolabe (as-tro-labe), 6, 7. 

Atlanta, taken by Sherman, 382. 

Atlantic cable, 357 (note). 

Austin, Moses, 321. 

Austrian emperor, overthrow of, 481. 

Austrians, in Georgia, 100 (note). 

Automobiles, 444. 

Bacon, Nathaniel, rebellion, 106. 

Bahamas, discovered, 11. 

Bainbridge, Commodore, 265. 

Balboa (ball-bo-ah), 15, 17. 

Ballinger scandal, 454. 

Baltimore, Lord, 90, 92. 

Baltimore, siege of, 268; Democratic 
Convention held at, 456. 

Bancroft, George, 298. 

Bank of the United States, founded, 
235, 236; destroyed by Jackson, 
305. 

Banks, state, issue paper money, 
305; “pet,”305,306;national,358. 

Barbary pirates, 213; war with, 254, 
255. 

Battle Above the Clouds, 376. 


Baxter, Richard, 312. 

Bayard, J. A., at Ghent, 269 (note). 
Bay Psalm Book, 136. 

“Bear Republic,” 325. 

Beef-packing industry, 433. 

Bell, Governor John, of Tennessee, 
candidate for presidency, 346. 

Bennington, battle of, 173. 

Berkeley, Governor, of Virginia, 105, 
106, 136. 

Berkeley, Lord, 83. 

Bible Commonw r ealth, 63, 64. 
Bicycle, 404. 

Biddle, Nicholas, 305 (note). 
“Biglow Papers,” 328. 

Bill of Rights, English, 104, 197; in 
state constitutions, 166. 

Billeting of soldiers, 198. 

Bills of credit, 157. 

Bills in Congress, 492. 

Biloxi (bi-lok-se) Bay, settlement at, 
35 (note). 

“Bird woman,” 252. 

Birmingham, 435. 

Birney, James G., 322. 

Blaine, James G., 408, 410. 

Blockade, of southern ports, 359, 
350. 

Blockade runners, 359, 360. 
“Bloody Bill,” 304. 

Bonhomme Richard (bo-nom' re- 
shahr), 184, 185. 

Boone, Daniel, 181. 

Booth, Wilkes, 390. 

Border States, 352, 353. 

Boston, founded, 60; port closed, 
149; siege of, 154, 155; taken by 
. Washington, 160, 161. 

Boston massacre, the, 146, 147. 
Boston Tea Party, 148, 149. 

Boundaries of U. S. fixed by treaty 
of Paris, 193; northeastern, fixed, 
311; southern, by annexation oi 
Texas, 323; northwestern, 399. 

Boxer Rebellion in China, 459, 460. 
Boyle, Captain, 266. 

Braddock, General, defeat of, 118. 
Braddock’s road, 116 (note). 
Bradford, WrG=, 52, 55 (note). 



INDEX 


Bragg, General, 373, 376. 

Brandywine Creek, battle of, 174. 

Breckenridge, J. C., candidate for 
president, 346. 

Breed’s Hill, 159. 

Brewster, Elder, 51. 

Brook Farm community, 317. 

Brooklyn Heights, 169. 

Brown, General, 267. 

Brown, John, 341 (note); also 344. 

Bryan, Wm. Jennings, 415, 416, 446, 
450, 456, 459. 

Bryant, Wm. Cullen, 298, 356. 

Buchanan (bu-kan'an), President, 
342-349. 

Buell (bu'el), General, 368, 370. 

Buena Vista (bw T a'nah ve'stah), bat¬ 
tle of, 324. 

“Bull Moose” Party, the, 455. 

Bull Run, first battle of, 363; second 
battle, 366. 

Bunker Hill, battle of, 159. 

Burgesses, House of, 47. 

Burgoyne (bur-goin), General, 173, 
174, 175. 

Burke, Edmund, 143, 151. 

Burnside, General, 367. 

Burr, Aaron, 247. 

Business, concentration of, 439. 

Butler, Colonel John, 179. 

Butler, General, 371. 

Cabeca de Vaca (kah-ba'tha da val/- 
kah), 17, 18, 19. 

Cabinet, origin of, 233; functions of, 
493. 

Cabot, John, 17, 18. 

“Caciques” (ka-seeks'), 96. 

Cadillac (kah-deel-yak), 35. 

Cairo (ka'ro), 368. 

Calhoun, John C., 260, 284; and 
tariff, 289; and State Rights, 303, 
304; and Compromise of 1850, 333. 

California, occupied by Mexicans, 
325; question of admission to 
Union, 331; admitted, 333; gold 
discovered in, 329, 330; “State 
Act” against Japanese, 459. 

Calvert, Cecil, 90. 

Camden, battle of, 189. 


lv 

Canada, early settlements in, 30-33; 
ceded to Great Britain, 121; reci¬ 
procity treaty with, 452. 

Canals, Erie, 277; Chesapeake and 
Ohio, 278 (note); in Pennsylvania, 
294; Panama, 446-448. 

Cannon, Speaker of House of Repre¬ 
sentatives, 453. 

Cape Ann, 57. 

Cape Cod, 53, 54. 

Capitol burned, 268. 

Carleton, General, 169, 170. 

Carolinas, settlement of, 95, 96; 
plans for government of, 96; be¬ 
come royal colonies, 97. See also 
North Carolina and South Caro¬ 
lina. 

Carpenter’s Hall, 150. 

“Carpetbaggers,” 395 (note). 

Carranza, rebel leader in Mexico, 
461. 

Carroll, Charles, 295. 

Carteret (kar'teret), Sir George, 83. 

Cartier (kar-tya'), 17, 21. 

Cass, Lewis, candidate for presi¬ 
dency, 329. 

Catholics, persecution of, in Eng¬ 
land, 91; Maryland as refuge for, 
91. 

Cattle-raising, 433. 

Caucus, nominating, 288. 

Cavaliers, 102, 103. 

Cedar Creek, battle of, 380. 

Census, 222. See also Population. 

Centennial Exposition, 402-403. 

Cerro Gordo (ser'ro gor'do), cap¬ 
tured, 325. 

Cervera (thair-va'rah), Admiral, 
418, 419. 

Champlain, Samuel de, 31, 33. 

Chancellorsville, battle of, 374. 

Charles I, of England, 58, 60, 102, 
103, 196. 

Charles II, of England, 86, 104, 105. 

Charleston, founded, 95; in the 
Revolution, 168, 189; secession 
declared at, 348. 

Charter colonies, 130, 131. 

Chase, Salmon P., 340, 346, 384; 
Chief Justice, 385 (note), 397. 

Chateau-Thierry, 479. 



INDEX 


Ivi 

Chattanooga, battle of, 376. 

Cherry Valley massacre, 179, 180. 

Chesapeake, 256, 265. 

Chicago, 263 (note); exposition, 403 
(note); beef-packing industry at, 
433; “ Progressive ’ ’ Convention 
held at, 455. 

Chickamauga, battle of, 375. 

China, relations with, 459, 460. 

Chinese Republic, 460. 

Chippewa, battle of, 267. 

Cincinnati, 229. 

City, problem of the great, 437, 438. 

Civil Rights Bill, 393. 

Civil Service, 408, 409. 

Civil War, 351-388; cost of, 389,390; 
Low tariff during, 458. 

Claiborne (kla'born), William, 93 
(note). 

Clark, Champ, 456. 

Clark, George Rogers, campaign of, 
182, 183. 

Clark, William, explores West, 251, 
252. 

Clay, Henry, Speaker of House of 
Representatives, 260; at Ghent, 
269 (note); candidate for presi¬ 
dency, 284, 285, 304, 322; Secre¬ 
tary of State, 286; and Tariff of 
Abominations, 289; and compro¬ 
mise tariff, 304; and Compromise 
in 1850, 332, 333. 

Clayton Bill, 459. 

Clemenceau, Georges, 482. 

Clermont, 253. 

Cleveland, Grover, President, 410, 
411; defeated for presidency, 411; 
President, 412-414. 

Clifton, Richard, 51. 

Clinton, De Witt, 277. 

Clinton, General Sir Henry, 168, 
179, 189. 

Clinton, George, Vice-President, 
254, 258. 

Coal, becomes used as fuel, 292; 
mines, 354; strike, 448. 

Cold Harbor, battle of, 378, 379. 

Coligny (ko-leen-ye'), 28. 

Colleges, in colonial times, 65, 66; 
land grants for, 317; in U. S. at 
time of Civil War, 356. 


Colonies, life in the, 122- 137; begin 
to feel independent of England, 
138. 

Colonization Society and Liberia, 
314. 

Colorado, silver in, 354. 

Columbia River, discovered, 252. 

Columbus, Christopher, 8-14. 

Commerce, British control of Colo¬ 
nial, 139, 140; in 1790, 226; effect 
of Embargo Act on, 257; non- 
intercourse and, 258; interstate, 
after War of 1812, 274-277; dur¬ 
ing Civil War, 359, 360; on Great 
Lakes, 436, 437. 

Commerce Court, 454. 

“Commission form of Government,” 
439. 

Committee of Correspondence, 147, 
148, 151. 

“Common Sense,” 162 (note). 

Compass, 6, 7. 

Compromise of 1850, 333. 

“Concessions,” the, 83. 

Concord, battle of, 153. 

Confederate States of America, or¬ 
ganized, 348, 349; recognized by 
foreign nations, 361 (note); end 
of, 390. 

Confederation, articles of, 167, 211- 
213. 

Congregational Church, founded, 65. 

Congress, Stamp Act, 142, 143; First 
Continental, 150; Second -Conti¬ 
nental, 155, 156, 163, 164; under 
Articles of Confederation, 167, 
211-213; under Constitution, 217- 
219; Committee of, 491. 

Conkling, Roscoe, 408. 

Connecticut, settled, 70; obtains 
charter, 105; government of, dur¬ 
ing revolution, 166; Western land 
claims of, 215. 

Conservation of natural resources, 
450. 

Constitution, English influence on, 
197; framed, 217, 220; ratified, 
221; new amendment to, 458; 
powers granted under, 485; Gen¬ 
eral Powers, 485; make-up of, 487; 
text of, Appendix, xxxvi-li. 

Constitution, vessel, 264, 265. 

Constitutional Convention, 216-220. 

Constitutional Party, 346. 



INDEX 


“Constitutionalists,” in Mexico, 461. 
Constitutions, early state, 166, 167. 

Continental Congress. See Con¬ 
gress. 

Conway Cabal, 178. 

Cooper, James Fenimore, 298, 356. 
Copernicus (ko-per'nih-kus), 4. 
Copper Mines, 354, 423. 

Copyrights, 499. 

Corinth, 370. 

Cornwallis, General, 171, 189, 190. 

Coronado, Francisco de (frahn-sees'- 
ko da Ko-ro-nah'-do), 17, 20, 21. 

Corporations, 439. 

“Corrupt Bargain,” 286. 

Cortes (kor-tez), 17, 18. 

Cosby, Governor, and Peter Zenger, 

137. 

Cost of the War, 482. 

Cotton, John, 132. 

Cotton, increase of cotton-growing 
area, 226, 227; price falls, 285. 

Cotton gin, 227, 279. 

Counties in South, 94, 131; officers 
of, 95, 132. 

Coureurs de bois (koo-rer deh 
bwah'), 33. 

Courts, national, established, 233, 
492. 

Cowpens, battle of, 190. 

Crawford, W. H., candidate for 
presidency, 284, 285, 288. 

Crittenden, Senator, 348. 

Cromwell, Oliver, 102-104. 

Crown Point, taken by Amherst, 120. 
Crusades, 2, 3. 

Crystal Palace, exhibition at, 336. 

Cuba, Columbus visits, 11; rebellion 
of, 416, 417; war in, 418-420. 

Culpepper, Lord, 105. 

Cumberland Pike, 116 (note). 
Cumberland Road, 276. 

Cummins, Senator, 454. 
Czecho-Slovakia, 484. 

Da Gama (dah gah'mah), Vasco, 7. 
Dale, Sir Thomas, 46, 47. 

Davenport, John, 72. 

Davis, Jefferson, and Kansas-Ne- 
braska bill, 340; elected President 


lvii 

of Confederacy, 348; orders bom¬ 
bardment of Fort Sumter, 351. 

Dearborn, Fort, 263. 

Debt, imprisonment for, 99. 

Debt, public, Hamilton’s plan for 
paying, 234, 235; at end of Civil 
War, 389; and fourteenth amend¬ 
ment, 393. 

Declaration of Independence, 163, 
164; text of, Appendix, xxxii- 

XXXV. 

Declaration of Rights, 151. 

Declaration of war between the Im¬ 
perial German Government and 
the Government and people of the 
United States made by Congress, 
April 6, 1917, 474. 

Declaratory Act, 145. 

Defeat of Germany, 481. 

De Grasse (deh gras'), Admiral, 190. 

Delaware, settled by Dutch, 79; 
becomes Swedish Colony, 80; re¬ 
gained by Dutch, 80; government 
of, in colonial times, 86 (note); 
border state, 352. 

Demarcation, line of, 17, 28. 

Democratic Convention, 456. 

Democratic Party, origin of, 287; 
divides on slavery question, 346. 

Democrat, War, 385. 

De Monts, 30. 

Departments, 494-497; of State, 
494; of Treasury, 494; of War, 
494; of Justice, 494; of Post-office, 
494-496; Navy, 496; of Interior, 
492; of Agriculture, 496; of Com¬ 
merce, 497; of Labor, 498. 

Deputies in Massachusetts, colony 
government, 63. 

Desert, Great American, 428. 

Des Moines, Iowa, “Commission 
Form of Government” tried at, 
460. 

De Soto, Hernando, 17, 19. 

Detroit, founded, 35; besieged by 
Pontiac, 122; in War of 1812, 262. 

De Vaca, Cabeca. See Cabeca de 
Vaca. 

Dewey, Admiral George, 418. 

Diaz (de'ahz), Cape of Good Hope, 
7. 

Diaz, President of Mexico, 460. 

Dickinson, John, 150, 217. 





INDEX 


lviii 


Dinwiddie, Governor of Virginia, 
117. 

“Direct Primaries,” 441. 

District of Columbia, slavery abol¬ 
ished in, 332, 333. 

Dix, Dorothea, 316. 

“Dollar” Diplomacy, 460. 

Dominion of New England, 107. 

Donelson, Fort, 369. 

Dongan, Thomas, 82. 

Dorchester, 70. 

Dorchester Heights, 160. 

Douglas, Stephen Arnold, and Kan- 
sas-Nebraska Act, 339, 340; de¬ 
bates with Lincoln, 343, 344; can¬ 
didate for presidency, 346. 

Dove , 91. 

Draft riots, 378. 

Drafting soldiers, 377. 

Drake, Sir Francis, 37, 38, 39, 40. 

Dred Scott decision, 342. 

“Dry Laws,” 443. 

Ducking stool, 64. 

Duke of York, 83, 86. 

Duke’s laws, the, 82. 

Duquesne, Fort, 117, 118. 

Duquesne (du-kane), Governor of 
Canada, 115, 116. 

Dutch, in America, 72, 74, 82. 

Dutch East India Company, 75, 76. 

Dutch West India Company, 76, 80. 

Dyer, Mary, 74. 

Early, General, 380. 

Earth, ideas of, in 15th century, 1, 2. 

Earthquake, San Francisco, 450 
(note). 

East, interest in wealth of, 4; Turks 
block way to, 5; trade routes to, 
6, 7. 

East India Company, Dutch, 75, 76; 
and Boston Tea Party, 148, 149. 

East Jersey, 83. 

Education in New England, 65, 66; 
in Pennsylvania, 89; in colonies, 
135, 136; encouragement of, 297, 
317; in North and South at time of 
Civil War, 354-356. 

Edward, Fort, 173. 

Eighteenth Century, 199. 


El Caney (el-kah'na), battle of, 419. 

Election, presidential. See Presi¬ 
dential election. 

Electoral Vote and the states carried 
by Wilson and Hughes respec¬ 
tively in 1916, 473. 

Electors, 231. 

Electricity, wonders of, 403, 404. 

Eliot, Sir John, 58. 

Elizabeth, queen of England, 36, 38, 
39. 

Emancipation Proclamation, 371- 
373. 

Embargo Act, 257. 

Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 298, 317, 
356. 

Endicott, John, 59. 

England, exploration of, in New 
World, 18; rise of power of, 36, 38; 
colonizes America, 38, 39, 41; in 
war with Spain, 39; reasons of, for 
colonizing America, 41, 42; relig¬ 
ious disputes in, 50, 51, 91; Crom¬ 
well and commonwealth in, 102, 
103; Restoration in, 104; Revolu¬ 
tion of 1688, 104; extent of colo¬ 
nies, 111; wars between, and 
France, 113-121; religious sects in, 
200; France and United States, 
209; treaties of arbitration with, 
453; demands indemnity from 
China, 459; attitude of, toward 
Mexico, 461. See also Great 
Britain. 

“Era of Good Feeling,” 271. 

Ericson, Leif, 9. 

Ericsson, John, 365. 

Erie Canal, 277. 

Erskine agreement, 258. 

Essex, 266. 

Estates General summoned, 207. 

Europe and America, 195; nations 
of, recognize Huerta’s govern¬ 
ment, 461. 

Excise tax, 236. 

Exposition, Centennial, 402-404; 
Chicago, 403 (note); St. Louis, 
403 (note). 

Express Companies, opposition of, 
to Parcels Post, 453, 454. 

Falmouth, burned, 162. 

Family of Nations in 1783, 202. 






INDEX 


lix 


“Farmers’ letters,” 150. 

Farms, Great Western, 429-431. 

Farragut, Admiral, 370, 381. 

Federal Hall, 232. 

Federal Reserve Banks, 501. 

Federal Trade Commission, 501. 

Federalists’ Party, 238, 239, 245, 
246, 270. 

Ferguson, Colonel, 189. 

Fessenden, William Pitt, 385. 

Filibusters, 417. 

Fillmore, Millard, elected Vice-Pres¬ 
ident, 329; President, 333-335. 

Fisheries, New England, 127, 128, 
224. 

Fitch, John, 253. 

Flatboat, 228, 229, 250, 253, 274, 
276. 

Flight of Kaiser into Holland, 481. 

Florida, explored, 16; English ob¬ 
tain, 121; ceded to Spain, 193; 
purchased by U. S., 281, 282; 
West, 281; secedes from Union, 
348. 

Florida, vessel, 381. 

Flour mills, colonial, 128; modern, 
431, 432. 

Food and Drug Act, National, 461. 

Foote, flag officer, 368, 369. 

Force Acts, 397. 

Force Bill, 304. 

Fort Amsterdam, founded, 76. 

Fort Orange, founded, 76. 

“Forty-niners,” 330, 331. 

Fox, George, 84, 85. 

France, explorations of, in New 
World, 21, 22; colonization of, 30, 
35, 111, 113; missionaries of, 32, 
33; progress of exploration by, 
in interior, 113; wars of, with 
England, 113, 121; aids U. S., 175, 
177, 184; relations with, 204; 

government of, before 1789, 207; 
Revolution in, 206, 239; wars of 
the Revolution, 207, 208; war be¬ 
tween, and U. S. on the ocean, 
244; war between, and Great 
Britain, 255, 262; recognizes Con¬ 
federate States, 361 (note); and 
occupation of Mexico, 399; treaties 
of arbitration with, 453; demands 
indemnity from China, 459; atti¬ 
tude of, toward Mexico, 461. 


Franchise (right to vote), restric¬ 
tions on, in 1790, 230, 231; man¬ 
hood suffrage, 287. 

Franklin, Benjamin, rise of, 126; and 
Albany Congress, 117, 118; in 
England, 144; in France, 176, 177; 
and treaty of Paris, 193; and Con¬ 
stitutional Convention, 217. 

Fredericksburg, battle of, 367. 

Freedman’s Bureau, 392, 393, 395 
(note). 

Freedom of press, 320. 

Free Soil Party, 329, 341. 

Fremont (fre-mont'), John C., 325, 
342. 

French and Indian War, 117-121. 

French Revolution, 207-209. 

Fries (fres) Rebellion, 249 (note). 

Frolic, 264. 

Frontenac (fron-teh-nak'), Count, 
114 (note). 

Frontenac, Fort, captured, 119. 

Frontier life about 1830, 293, 294. 

Fugitive Slave Law, 332, 333, 334. 

Fulton, Robert, 252. 

Fundamental Constitutions, 96 
(note). 

Fur trade, 33, 72, 76, 128. 

Gabriel Insurrection, 314 (note). 

Gadsden Purchase, 326. 

Gage, General, 152, 153, 159. 

“Gag resolutions,” 320. 

Gallatin, Albert, at Ghent, 269 
(note). 

Galliopolis, 229 (note). 

Galveston, famous flood of, 439. 

Garfield, James A., President, 407- 
409. 

Garrison, William Lloyd, 315, 316, 
319. 

Gas, used for lighting, 292. 

Gaspee (gas-pay') affair, 148. 

Gates, General, 174, 189. 

Genet (sheh-nay'), Citizen, 240. 

Genoa, 5. 

George III, of England, 141, 162, 
164. 

George, Lloyd, at Peace Conference, 
482. 

Georgia, founded, 100; early history 




ix 


INDEX 


of, 100, 101; secedes from Union, 
348. 

Georgia, vessel, 381. 

German offensive, March, 1918, 479. 

Germans settle in Pennsylvania, 89; 
in Carolina, 96. 

Germantown, battle of, 174. 

Germany demands indemnity from 
China, 459. 

Germany, defeat of, 481. 

Gerry, Elbridge, 244. 

“Gerrymander,” 301. 

Gettysburg, battle of, 374, 375. 

Ghent, Treaty of, 269, 270. 

Gilbert, Sir Humphrey, 38. 

Gold, discovery of, in California, 
330; rush for, 330, 331; discovery 
of, around Pike’s Peak, 422. 

Gold Democrats, 415. 

Gomez (go'meth), 17, 18. 

Government, English ideas of, 195; 
two-government system, 485; 
three-government system, 486; 
many officers of, 486. 

Government regulation of food dur¬ 
ing Great War, 478. 

Grain elevators, 432. 

“Grand Model,” 96, 97. 

Grant, General U. S., in Civil War, 
368-370, 373, 375, 376, 378-388; 
President, 399, 400. 

Gray, Captain, 252. 

Great American desert, 428. 

Great Britain, at war with American 
colonies, 138-193; relations with, 
204; refuses to give up posts on 
northern frontier, 212, 240; Jay 
treaty with, 241; wars of, with 
France, 255-262; impresses Amer¬ 
ican seamen, 256; in War of 1812 
with U. S., 261-271; sympathizes 
with South in Civil War and rec¬ 
ognizes Confederate States, 359— 
361; and Alabama claims, 399. 

Great Lakes, discovered, 21; com¬ 
merce of, 354, 436, 437. 

Great Valley, the, 181. 

Great War, the, 462. 

Greeley, Horace, opinion of seces¬ 
sion, 349; candidate for presi¬ 
dency, 400. 

Greenback, trouble, 405, 406; party, 
406. 


Greene, Nathaniel, General, 155, 
190. 

Greenville, Prime Minister, 141. 

Guadalupe Hidalgo (gwa-tha-loo'- 
pa e-thal'-go), treaty of, 325, 326. 

Guam (gwaham), ceded to U. S., 420. 

Guerriere (gar-ryar), 264. 

Guilford Court House, battle of, 190. 

Gunboats, Jefferson’s, 256. 

Gunpowder, the invention of, 5. 

Gustavus Adolphus, 80. 

Hague Tribunal, 448 (note). 

“Hail Columbia,” 244. 

Haiti discovered, 12. 

Half Moon, 75. 

Halleck, General, 368. 

Hamilton, Alexander, and Constitu¬ 
tional Convention, 217; Secretary 
of Treasury, 233-236; sketch of, 
237, 445. 

Hamilton, Colonel, 180 (note), 183. 

Hamlin, Hannibal, candidate for 
Vice-President, 346. 

Hancock, Gen. Winfield S., candi¬ 
date, 407. 

Hancock, John, 146, 153. 

Harper’s Ferry, 344. 

Harrison, Benjamin, President, 411. 

Harrison, Gen. Wm. Henry, at 
Tippecanoe, 260, 263; President, 
309, 310; death of, 310. 

Hartford, founded, 70; Dutch fort 
at, 81. 

Hartford Convention, 270. 

Harvard, John, 66. 

Harvard College, founded, 65, 66. 

Hawaiian (hah-wi'yan) Islands, rev¬ 
olution in, 413; annexation of, 413. 

Hawkins, John, 37, 39. 

Hawthorne, Nathaniel, 298, 317, 
356. 

Hay, John, 447, 460. 

Hayes, Rutherford B., and election 
dispute, 401, 402; President, 402- 
407. 

Haymarket Square, 410. 

Hayne, Robert Y., 302-304. 

Health, National Bureau of, 443. 

Henrietta Maria, Maryland named 
for, 91. 




INDEX 


Henry IV, of France, 30. 

Henry the Navigator, Prince, 6, 7. 

Henry, Patrick, 94, 141, 142, 150, 
182. 

Henry, Fort, 369. 

Herkimer, General, 173. 

Hessians, 171. 

Hobson, Lieutenant, 418. 

Holland, Puritans flee to, 51; Puri¬ 
tans sail from, 52; establishes set¬ 
tlements in America, 74, 75. 

Holmes, Oliver Wendell, 298, 356. 

Holy Alliance, 282, 283. 

Homestead Act of 1862, 427. 

Hood, General, 382, 383, 385. 

Hooker, General (“Fighting Joe”), 
367, 374, 376. 

Hooker, Thomas, 70. 

Hornet, 265. 

Horse-cars, 292. 

Horseshoe Bend, battle of, 269. 

House of Burgesses, 47. 

Houston, Sam, 321. 

Howe, General William, 160, 161, 
169, 171, 174. 

Hudson, Henry, 75, 76. 

Huerta, General, of Mexico, 460,461. 

Hughes, Charles E., presidential 
candidate, 1916, 471. 

Huguenots (hu-geh-nots'), persecu¬ 
tion of, 28; first attempts to settle 
in America, 28, 29; in Carolinas, 
95, 96. 

Hull, General, 262. 

Hutchinson, Anne, 69 ? 70. 

Idaho, admitted to Union, 428. 

Illinois, becomes state, 273; rich 
prairie lands of, 274. 

Immigration, sources of, 203; be¬ 
tween 1820 and 1860, 337, 338; 
later, 437, 438, 442. 

Impeachment, 397, 398. 

Impressment, 256, 270. 

Indentured servants, 49. 

Independence, Declaration of, 163, 
184; text of Appendix, xxxii-xxxv. 

Independence, war for, 152-193. 

Independent treasury bill, 308. 

India, routes to, 6, 7, 8. 


lxi 

Indians, named by Columbus, 11; 
manners and customs of, 22, 24; 
method of letting land, 68 (note); 
Pequots, 72; colonists have trouble 
with, 72, 73, 106; Penn’s peace 
with, 88; Iroquois, 112; Algon- 
quins, 112 (note); French and, 
113; in Revolution, 180, 182; at¬ 
tacks by, on frontier, 241; con¬ 
federation of, destroyed by Gen¬ 
eral Harrison, 259, 260. 

Indigo, grown in Carolinas, 98. 

Industries, in colonies, 127-129 •_ 
northern, 422-441. 

“Initiative,” the, 441. 

“Insurgents,” 452. 

Intercolonial Committees of Cor¬ 
respondence, organized, 148. 

Internal Improvements, 285, 310. 

Interstate Commerce Commission, 
443, 448, 500. 

Intolerable Acts, 149. 

Inventions, shown at Crystal Palace 
in 1855, 336, 337; modern, 443. 

Iowa, admitted to Union, 339 (note). 

Iron mines, 354. 

Iroquois (ir-o-kwoi), 32, 112, 118. 

Irrigation, 448. 

Irving, Washington, 298, 356. 

Isabella, Queen, aids Columbus, 10. 

Island No. 10, 370. 

Jackson, General Andrew, at New 
Orleans, 269; candidate for presi¬ 
dency, 284, 285, 288, 289; Presi¬ 
dent, 299-307; character of, 299. 

Jackson, General Thomas J. 
(“Stonewall”), 364, 366. 

Jalapa (hah-lah'pah), captured, 325. 

James I, of England, 41, 51, 58. 

James II, of England, 82, 104, 107, 
196. 

Jamestown founded, 43. 

Japan, controversy with, over Cali¬ 
fornia “State Act,” 459-460. 

Java, 265. 

Jay, John, and first Continental 
Congress, 150; and Treaty of Paris, 
193; Chief Justice, 233. 

Jay Treaty, 241. 

Jefferson, Thomas, 94; draws up 
Declaration of Independence, 163, 
164; Secretary of Foreign Affairs, 




INDEX 


lxii 

233; sketch of, 238; Vice-Presi¬ 
dent, 243; President, 247-257; 
Woodrow Wilson compared to, 
459. 

Jersey, East. 83; West, 83. 

Jesuits, in America, 32 (note). 

Jogues (zhog), Isaac, 32 (note). 

Johnson, Andrew, elected Vice- 
President, 385; President, 391— 
398. 

Johnson, Sir William, 118-120. 

Johnston, General Joseph E., 364, 
365, 386, 388. 

Jones, Captain Paul, 184, 185. 

Jury, right of trial by, 143 (note). 

Kaiser, flight of, into Holland, 481. 

Kansas, border war in, 340-342; 
admitted to Union, 341. 

Kansas-Nebraska Bill, 339, 340. 

Kaskaskia, 182. 

Kearney, Colonel Stephen W., 325- 

Kearsarge, 381. 

Kentucky, settled, 181; country 
ceded toU. S., 183; fertile lands of, 
274; border state, 352; in Civil 
War, 368, 369. 

Kentucky Resolutions, 246. 

Key, Francis Scott, 269 (note). 

Kieft (keft), Governor, of New 
Netherland, 80. 

King George’s War, 115. 

King Philip’s War, 73. 

King William’s War, 114. 

King’s Mountain, battle of, 189. 

Knights of Labor, 410. 

Knights of Columbus, 477. 

“Know-Nothing” Party, 338. 

Knox, Henry, Secretary of War, 233. 

Ku Klux Klan, 397. 

Labor, unions, 410; problem, 406, 
407, 414. 

Labor-contract laws, 392. 

Lafayette (lah-fa-yet'), General, 176, 
190. 

La Follette, Senator, 453, 454, 455. 

La Isla Espanola (la e'lah es-phan- 
yo-lah) or Haiti, discovered, 12. 

Lancaster, Congress moves to, 174. 

“Landgraves,” 96. 


Land office, 293. 

Lands, public. See Public lands. 

La Salle (lah sal'), 33, 34. 

Laurens, Henry, 96 (note). 

Lawrence, Captain, 265. 

Lawrence, vessel, 264. 

Lead mines, 423. 

Leaden plates, 35, 115. 

League of Nations, 483. 

Leavenworth, Fort, 325. 

Lee, General Charles, 168, 170, 179. 

Lee, Richard Henry, 150, 163. 

Lee, General Robert E., 358, 364- 
366, 374, 375, 378, 386-388. 

“Leet men,” 96. 

Legal-tender notes, 358. 

Legislature, colonial, 47, 63, 109; 
under constitution, 217. 

Leif Ericson, 9. 

Leisler (lis'ler), Jacob, 108. 

Leopard, 256. 

Lewis, Meriwether, 251, 252. 

Leyden, 52. 

Lexington, battle of, 153. 

Liberal Republican Party, 400. 

Liberator, The, 315. 

Liberia, 314. 

Liberty, vessel, 146; in America, 198- 

Liberty Party, 322. 

Limestone, 229 (note). 

Lincoln, Abraham, early life of, 293 
(note), 343 (note); in Congress, 
328; debates of, with Douglas, 
343, 344; nominated for President 
and elected, 346, 347; President, 
349-391; inaugural address of, 
349, 350; and Emancipation Proc¬ 
lamation, 370-373; political 
quarrels of, 384; and plans for re¬ 
constructing South, 392; assassi¬ 
nation of, 390, 391. 

Literature, in colonies, 136, 137; in 
1830, 298; anti-slavery, 318; in 
North at time of Civil War, 356. 

Livingston, American Minister to 
France, 250. 

Lloyd George, leader of delegation 
from Great Britain, 482. 

Locke, John, 96 (note). 

Locomotives, steam, 295, 296. 

Log-cabin campaign, 309. 




INDEX 


Ixiii 


London Company, 42, 47, 53. 

Longfellow, Henry W., 298, 318, 356. 

Long Island, owned by Duke of 
York, 83; battle of, 169. 

Lookout Mountain, 376. 

Loom, power, 225. 

Lord Protector, Cromwell, made, 
103. 

Louis XIV, of France, 35. 

Louisburg, fortress of, 115, 119. 

Louisiana, settled, 35; ceded to 
Spain, 121; purchased by U. S., 
250, 251; becomes a state, 273; 
secedes from Union, 348. 

Lovejoy, Elijah, 319. 

Lowell, James Russell, 298, 328. 

Loyalists, 151, 163, 179, 183. 

Lumber trade, in colonial times, 128; 
of Michigan and Wisconsin, 354. 

Lundy, Benjamin, 315. 

Lundy’s Lane, battle of, 267, 268. 

McClellan, General George B., in 
Civil W’ar, 363-367; candidate for 
presidency, 385. 

McCormick reaper, 337. 

McDowell, General, 363. 

McDonough, Commodore, 268. 

Macedonian, 265. 

McHenry, Fort, 269. 

Machinery, agricultural, 429-431. 

McKinley, William, President, 416— 
422; assassination of, 446. 

McKinley Bill, 411. 

Macomb, General, 267, 268. 

Macon Bill No. 2, 259. 

Madero, revolutionary leader in 
Mexico, 460, 461. 

Madison, James, and constitutional 
convention, 217; President, 258- 
271. 

Magellan, Ferdinand, 15, 16. 

Magna Charta, 196. 

“Magnalia,” 136. 

Maine settled, 72, 73; admitted as a 
state, 281; boundary dispute, 311. 

Maine, battleship, 417. 

Malvern Hill, battle of, 366. 

Manassas Junction, battle of, 363. 

Manhattan Island, 76, 77. 

Manhood Suffrage, 287. 


Manila, battle of, 418. 

Mann, Horace, 317. 

Manors, 94 (note). 

Manufactures, forbidden in colonies, 
128; in 1790, 225; in New Eng¬ 
land, 225, 284; protection of, 272, 
273; recent, 429, 435, 436. 

Marco Polo, 3. 

Marcos, Friar, 20. 

Marietta, 229 (note), 230 (note). 

Marion, General Francis, 96 (note), 
189. 

Marshall, John, 244, 303. 

Maryland, founded, 91; early history 
of, 92, 94; border state in Civil 
War, 352; invaded by Lee, 366, 
367. 

Mason and Dixon’s line, 86 (note), 
92, 303. 

Mason and Slidell, incident of, 360, 
361. 

Massachusetts, colony, government 
of, 63, 64; education in, 65; loses 
charter, 105; gets new charter, 
107; charter remodeled, 149; forms 
a provincial Congress, 152; claims 
western lands, 215. 

Massachusetts Bay, Governor and 
Company of, 57; charter granted, 
59. 

Massasoit (mas-sa-soit'), 55. 

Matamoros (mat-a-mo'ros), 324. 

Mather, Cotton, 136. 

Maximilian, in Mexico, 398, 399. 

Mayflower, 53, 55. 

Mayflower Compact, 53, 54, 56; text 
of Appendix, xxxi. 

Memphis captured, 370. 

Menendez (ma-nen-deth), 29. 

Mennonites, 89. 

Merrimac and Monitor, 364, 365. 

Merrimac , collier, 419. 

Meuse-Argonne battle, 481; com¬ 
parison with battle of Wilderness 
fought during Civil War, 481. 

Mexico, Spanish colonize, 28; inde¬ 
pendent of Spain, 321; Texas se¬ 
cedes from, 320, 321; war with 
U. S., 323-326; and French occu¬ 
pation, 399; condition of affairs 
in, 460-462. 

Mexico, City of, taken, 325; Madero 



lxiv 


INDEX 


assassinated in streets of, 461; 
Carranza enters, 461. 

Michigan, 274; admitted to Union, 
317; founds university, 317; lum¬ 
ber trade of, 354; mines of, 354. 

“Milk for babes,” 132. 

Mill, flour, in colonial times, 128; 
development of, 431, 432. 

Minutemen, 153. 

Missionaries, French, in New World, 
32, 33. 

Missionary Ridge, 376. 

Mississippi, admitted to Union, 273; 
secedes, 348; readmitted, 398. 

Mississippi River, discovery of, 19; 
La Salle takes possession of, 34; 
importance of western trade on, 
241, 242. 

Mississippi Valley, French forts in, 
115, 116; early settlements in, 181. 

Missouri, asks to be admitted as 
state, 278; admitted, 281; border 
state during Civil War, 352; lead 
mines in, 354; votes to remain in 
Union, 368. 

Missouri Compromise, 280, 281, 339, 
343. 

Mobile, founded, 35; captured by 
Farragut, 381. 

Monarchy in Europe and democ¬ 
racy in America, 206. 

Money, in circulation at end of 
Revolution, 213, 214. See also 
Paper money. 

Mongolian race insulted, 459. 

Monitor and Merrimac, 365. 

Monmouth, battle of, 179. 

Monroe, James, commissioner to 
France, 251; President, 271-283. 

Monroe Doctrine, 282, 283, 458. 

Montana admitted to Union, 428. 

Montcalm, General, 120, 121. 

Monterey (mon-te-ray'), battle of, 
324. 

Montgomery, Richard, 161. 

Montgomery, Confederate States 
organized at, 348. 

Montreal, founded, 21; captured by 
Amherst, 121. 

Mormon, Book of, 317. 

Mormons, 317, 318, 424. 

Morris, Robert, 171 (note), 212. 


Morristown, Washington winters 
at, 172. 

Morse, Samuel F. B., 356. 

Motley, John L., 298. 

Moultrie, General, 168. 

Mt. Vernon, Washington’s home, 
232. 

Napoleon Bonaparte, 245, 250, 255, 
259, 261, 267, 269. 

Napoleon III, 398. 

Napoleonic Period, end of, 210. 

Narvaez (nar-vah-eth'), 18. 

Naseby, battle of, 102. 

Nashville, battle of, 383. 

Nassau, in West Indies, 360. 

Nations, Family of, in 1783, 202. 

National Banks, organized, 358. 

National Committee, 455. 

National Convention, 455. 

National Road (Cumberland), 276. 

Naturalization Act, 245; process of, 
498. 

Nauvoo, 318 (note). 

Navigation acts, 106, 108, 109. 

Navy, France aids American, 184; 
Paul Jones and, 184, 185; in War 
of 1812, 264, 265; in Civil War, 
359; in War with Spain, 418-420. 

Nebraska, territory, 339. 

Necessity, Fort, 117. 

Negro problem, the, 442. 

Nemacolin’s Path, 116 (note). 

Neutrality, Proclamation of, 240. 

Nevada, silver in, 354. 

New Amsterdam, settlement of, 77; 
besieged by English, 81; becomes 
New York, 82. 

New England, Council for, 57; set¬ 
tlement of, 57-62; early punish¬ 
ments in, 64, 65; schools in, 65, 66; 
trouble with Indians, 72; Con¬ 
federation, 72, 73, 150; Dominion 
of, 107. 

“New England Primer,” 136. 

Newfoundland, English claims ac¬ 
knowledged, 115.' 

New Hampshire, settled, 72; made 
royal province, 105. 

New Harmony, community, 317. 



INDEX 


lxv 


New Haven, founded, 70; joined 
with Connecticut, 72, 105. 

New Jersey, settlement of, 82, 83. 

New Madrid, 369. 

New Mexico, 325. 

New Netherland, 77, 81. 

New Orleans, founded, 35; place of 
deposit granted at, 242; port of, 
closed to Americans, 250; pur¬ 
chased from France, 251; battle 
of, 269; captured by Farragut, 
370. 

Newport, founded, 69. 

News Letter , first colonial newspaper, 

137. 

Newspaper, first daily, 90, 137; 
colonial, 137. 

New Sweden, 80. 

Newton, 70. 

Newtown, battle of, 180. 

New York, representative self- 
government in, 82; claims western 
lands, 215 (note). 

New York City, in 1790, 224; first 
capital of U. S., 232; affected by 
building of Erie Canal, 277/278; 
in 1830, 291, 292; draft riots in, 
378; city government reform in, 
439. 

Niagara Falls, Mexican delegates 
meet at, 461. 

Nicholls, Governor, of New York, 82. 

Non-conformists, 51. 

Non-intercourse act, 258. 

North, tariff in, 289, 290, 301, 302, 
358; population at time of Civil 
War, 353; resources of, 354; rail¬ 
roads in, 354; education in, 354, 
355; military training of, 357. 

North, Lord, resigns, 190, 192. 

North Carolina, beginnings of, 95; 
becomes royal colony, 97; early 
industries, 97; joins Confederacy, 
352. 

North Dakota, admitted to Union, 
428. 

North Pole, 444. 

Northwest Territory organized, 215, 
216. 

Nova Scotia discovered, 18. 

Nullification, 246; in South Carolina, 
303, 304. 


Ogden, 426. 

Oglethorpe, General James, 99. 

Ohio, admitted to Union, 273; timber 
lands of, 274; coal mined in, 354. 

Oil Trust, 454. 

“Old Guard,” 452. 

“Old Hickory,” 288. 

“Old Ironsides,” 265. 

“Old Secession,” 348. 

Orange, Fort, founded, 76. 

“Order of the Star-Spangled Ban¬ 
ner,” 339. 

Orders in Council, 255, 261 (note). 

Ordinance of 1787, 215. 

Oregon, early history of, 321, 322; 
secured by treaty, 326, 327; 

boundary settled, 399. 

Oregon , vessel, 447 (note). 

Oregon trail, 424. 

Oriskany (o-ris'ka-ne), battle of, 
173. 

Orlando, Premier Vittorio, 482. 

Osgood, Samuel, 233. 

Ossawatomie (os-a-wat'e-me), 341 
(note). 

Otis, James, 140. 

Overthrow of Austrian emperor, 481. 

Owen, Robert, 317. 

Pacific Ocean, discovered, 15; 
named, 15. 

Pacific Railroads, 425-427. 

Paine, Thomas, 162. 

Pakenham, General, 269. 

Palo Alto, battle of, 324. 

Panama Canal, 447. 

Panic of 1837, 307, 308; of 1873, 400; 
of 1893, 413, 414. 

Paper money printed by Continental 
Congress, 157; evils of, 186, 187, 
214; during Civil War, 358; of 
confederacy, 388, 389. See also 
Greenback trouble; Legal-tender 
notes. 

Parcels Post, 448, 453, 495-496. 

Paris, Treaty of, 121; Declaration 
of, 210. 

Parkman, Francis, 32, 35, 356. 

Parliament, 47, 58, 63; representa¬ 
tion in, 144, 145. 

“Parson’s Cause,” the, 140, 141. 





lxvi 


INDEX 


Patents, 499. 

Patroons, 78, 79. 

Payne-Aldrich Tariff, The, 452. 

Peace Conference, in January, 1919, 
at Paris, 482. 

Peace Treaty, 483. 

Peacock, 265. 

Peary, Commodore, 444. 

Pekin, occupied, 460. 

Pemberton, General, 375. 

Peninsular campaign, 364. 

Penn, William, 83, 85, 88, 90. 

Pennsylvania, charter granted, 86; 
boundary dispute in, 86 (note); 
settled, 87; early government of, 
87; mines of, 354. 

Pequot (pe'kwot), Indians, 72. 

Percy, Lord, 154. 

Peril of German Victory, 473. 

Perote (pa-ro'-ta), captured, 325. 

Perry, Commodore Oliver H., 254. 

Pershing, General, 477. 

Personal liberty laws, 334. 

Peru, 18. 

Petersburg, 379. 

Petition, right of, 143 (note), 320. 

Petroleum, 354. 

Philadelphia, founded, 88; conven¬ 
tion at, 216-220; in 1790, 225; 
capital of U. S., 248 (note); 
Centennial Exposition at, 302- 
304; City government reform in, 
439. 

Philanthropy, modern, 438. 

Philip, King, war with, 73. 

Philippine Islands, discovered, 15; 

colonized, 27: ceded to U. S., 420; 
annexed, 447; government estab¬ 
lished in, 450; race problem in, 
442. 

Phonograph, 404. 

Pickens, Andrew, 189. 

Pickett’s charge, 375. 

Pierce, Franklin, President, 336- 
342. 

Pig controversy, 63. 

Pike, Zebulon, 252 (note). 

Pike’s Peak gold discoveries, 422. 

Pilgrims, 52-56. 

Pillory, 64. 


Pinckney, C. C., 243. 

Pineda (pe-na'thah), 17, 18. 

Pitt, William, 119, 144, 151. 

Pittsburg, Fort Duquesne, becomes, 
119 (note); routes to, 274; mines 
near, 274; railway strike of 1877 
at, 406. 

Pittsburg Landing, or Shiloh, battle 
of, 370. 

Pizarro (pe-thar'o), 17, 18. 

Plains of Abraham, 121. 

Plantation, organization of, 129 
(note). 

Platt, Senator, 408. 

Plattsburg, 268. 

Plymouth, founded, 54; government 
of colony, 55, 56. 

Plymouth Company, gets charter, 
43; makes settlement in Maine, 43. 

Pocahontas, 45 (note). 

Poe, Edgar Allan, 298, 356. 

Poland, 484. 

Political Reforms, 441. 

Polk, James K., nominated for 
president, 322; president, 323-328. 

Polo, Marco, 3. 

Ponce de Leon (pon'tha da la-on'), 
16, 17, 18. 

Pontiac (pon'te-ak), conspiracy of, 

121 , 122 . 

Pony express, 424. 

“Poor Richard’s Almanac,” 135, 
136. 

Pope, General, 366, 370. 

Population, in 1790, 222, 223; in 
1830, 291; in 1876, 403; in 1910, 
449; by decades, Appendix, xxx. 

Populists, 412. 

Portage railroad, 294. 

Porto Rico, ceded to U. S., 420. 

Port Royal (S. C.), founded, 28; 
destroyed, 29. 

Portsmouth, founded, 69; treaty of, 
445, 448. 

Portugal, explorations, 6, 7; gets 
Brazil, 28. 

Postal Savings Banks, 453, 495. 

Postal Service, in colonies, 127; 
organized by Continental Con¬ 
gress, 157; department created by 
Congress, 233. 




INDEX 


Powhatan (pow-ha-tan'), 45 (note). 

Prairie schooner, 423. 

Preparedness Campaign and Opposi¬ 
tion, 471; General Leonard Wood 
acknowledged leader in movement 
for military preparedness, 471; 
opposition of more idealistic than 
practical men who urged “peace 
at any price,” 471. 

Prescott, Colonel, 159. 

Prescott, William H., 298. 

Presidential Campaign of 1916, 471. 

Presidents, method of electing, 231; 
table of, Appendix, xxviii. 

Presidential election, first, 231; 1792, 
239; 1796, 243; 1800, 247; 1804, 
254; 1808, 258; 1812, 266; 1816, 
271; 1820, 272; 1824, 285; 1826, 
288: 1832, 304; 1836, 307; 1840, 
309: 1844, 322; 1848, 329; 1852, 
336: 1856, 342; 1860, 347; 1864, 
385; 1868, 398; 1872, 400; 1876, 
401, 402; 1880, 407; 1884, 410; 
1888, 411; 1892, 412; 1896, 416; 
1900, 446; 1904, 446; 1908, 450; 
1912, 457. 

Presidential succession law, 411. 

Press, freedom of, 320. 

Prevost (pre-vo'), General, 268. 

Princeton, battle of, 171. 

Princeton University, 456. 

Printing, discovery of, 4. 

Prisons, conditions of early, 99, 230; 
first modern in U. S., 316. 

Privateers, 266; during Civil War, 
381. 

Proctor, General, 263. 

Progressive Convention, 456. 

Progressive Party, 441. 

“Progressives,” 453, 454. 

“Prophet,” the, 259, 260. 

Proprietary colonies, 91, 130, 131. 

Proprietor, Lord, 90. 

Protection, 272, 273, 284. See also 
Tariff. 

Protestant Revolt, 26. 

Providence founded, 68. 

Providence Plantations, 69. 

Province Charter, granted to Mas¬ 
sachusetts, 107. 

Provincial Congress, of Massachu¬ 
setts, 152. 


lxvii 

Public lands, 215, 273 (note), 293 
(note); Homestead Act of 1862, 
427. 

Pueblos, 21. 

Puritanism, 51, 58, 60, 67, 74. 

Putnam, Israel, 155. 

Quakers, founding of sect, 84; be¬ 
liefs of, 85, 87; persecution of, in 
Massachusetts, 73, 74; in New 
Jersey, 83; Penn founds colony 
for, 88. 

Quebec, founded, 31; captured by 
Wolfe, 120, 121. 

Quebec Act, 150 (note). 

Queen Anne’s War, 114, 115. 

Quincy, Josiah, 147 (note). 

Railroads, earliest, 295, 296; 1860, 
354, 355; strikes, 406, 410; Pacific, 
425-427; importance of, 427; 
problem of regulating of, 443. 

Raleigh, Sir Walter, 39. 

Randolph, Edward, Attorney-Gen¬ 
eral, 233. 

Randolph, John, of Virginia, 273- 
281, 289. 

Ranger, 184. 

Reaper, McCormick, 337. 

“Recall,” the, 441. 

Reconstruction, problem of, 391; 
Lincoln’s plan, 392; actual process 
of, 392-398, 405. 

Reconstruction Act, 394. 

Red Cross Service, 477. 

“Referendum,” the, 441. 

Reformation, the, 25, 26, 50. 

Reform movements, 316-318. 

“Regulars,” the, 455. 

Religion in New England, 64, 132, 
133 ; in South, 133; in Europe, 200. 

Religious Sects in England, 200. 

Religious Toleration, 201. 

Representatives, House of, provided 
for in constitution, 218, 219, 489; 
powers of, 490. 

Republican Party, formed, 239; 
splits, 283, 284, 287; new, 341; 
reform faction of the, 453; rup¬ 
ture of the, 454, 455. 

Resaca de La Palma, battle of, 324. 

Revenues of the Government, 497, 
498. 




lxviii 


INDEX 


Revere, Paul, 153. 

Revolution, French, American sym¬ 
pathy, 239, 240. 

Revolution of 1688, 104. 

Rhode Island colony, 69, 73; given 
charter, 105; government of, dur¬ 
ing revolution, 166. 

Ribaut (re-bo'), 28, 29. 

Rice, cultivation of, in South Caro¬ 
lina, 98. 

Richmond, becomes Confederate 
capital, 352; Grant besieges, 379, 
380. 

Right of petition, 143 (note), 320. 

Ripley, Colonel, 267. 

Roads, to West, 228, 229, 274, 275. 

Roanoke, Island, 39. 

Robertson, James, 181, 182. 

Robinson, John, 51. 

Rochambeau (ro-shon-bo'), General, 
190. 

Rolfe, John, 45 (note). 

Roosevelt, Colonel Theodore, in 
Cuba, 419; succeeds to presidency, 
446; President, 446-450; influence 
of, on Republican Party, 450; 
hunting expedition of, to Africa, 
452; a popular hero, 454-456; re¬ 
fuses to run as an opposition can¬ 
didate in 1916; stands for true 
Americanism, 472. 

Root, Elihu, 447. 

Rosecrans, General, 373, 375. 

Rough Riders, 419. 

Roundheads, 102. 

Royal Colonies, 91, 130, 131. 

Royalists. See Cavaliers. 

Russell, J., at Ghent, 269 (note). 

Russia, claims large portion of Pa¬ 
cific Coast. 282, 283; demands 
indemnity from China, 460. 

Sabbath, observation of, in New 
England, 132, 133; in South, 133. 

Sachem, 24. 

St. Augustine, 29, 99. 

St. Lawrence River, discovered, 21. 

St. Leger, General, 173, 174. 

St. Louis Exposition, 403 (note). 

St. Mary’s founded, 91. 

St. Mihiel, American army drives 


back German line at, in Septem¬ 
ber, 1918, 481. 

Salem witchcraft, 134. 

Salt Lake City, 424. 

Salt Lake Trail, 424. 

Salvation Army, 477. 

Sampson, Admiral, 418, 419, 420. 

Sandys, Sir Edwin, 47. 

San Francisco earthquake, 450 
(note). 

San Jacinto, battle of, 321. 

San Jacinto, vessel, 360. 

San Juan Hill, battle of, 419. 

San Salvador, 11. 

Santa Anna, 321, 324. 

Santa Fe (san'tah fa'), taken by 
Kearney, 325. 

Santa Fe trial, 423. 

Santiago, battle of, 420. 

Saratoga, battle of, 175. 

Savannah, founded, 100; captured 
by British, 189; in Civil War, 383. 

Saybrook, founded, 72 (note), 81. 

“Scalawags,” 395 (note). 

Schenectady, attacked by French 
and Indians, 114. 

Schley, Admiral, 420. 

Schools, in colonies, 135, 136; 

growth of, 297; in North and 
South at time of Civil War, 354- 
356. See also Education. 

Schuyler, Gen. Philip, 173, 174. 

Scotch Highlanders, in America, 96, 
100 (note). 

Scotch Irish, in America, 89, 96. 

Scott, General Winfield, in War of 
1812, 267; in Mexican War, 324, 
325; candidate for presidency, 336; 
opinion of, on secession, 349. 

Scrooby, 51. 

Sea dogs, the, 37, 39. 

Sea of Darkness, 2. 

Secession, 347, 348. 

Sedition Act, 245. 

Senate, provided for in Constitu¬ 
tion, 218, 489; Powers of, 490. 

Separation of Powers, 466. 

Separatists, 51. 

Serapis (se-ra'pis), 185. 

Settlers, French and German, 203. 




INDEX 


Lxix 


Seward, W. H., 333, 340, 346, 349, 
399. 

Seymour, Horatio, candidate for 
presidency, 398. 

Shatter, General, 419. 

Shannon, 265. 

Shay’s rebellion, 214. 

Shenandoah Valley, settled, 181; 
Sheridan in, 380. 

Sheridan, General Philip, 380. 

Sherman, General William T., 376, 
382, 383, 385, 386, 388. 

Sherman Act, 412; repealed, 414. 

Sherman Anti-trust Law, 440, 459. 

Shiloh, or Pittsburg Landing, battle 
of, 370. 

Silver, coinage of, 412; question, 413, 
415; mines, 423. 

Slavery, introduced into colonies, 
49, 98, 101; growth of, in Southern 
colonies, 129; early sentiments 
against, 219; causes compromises 
in Constitution, 219, 220; effect 
of invention of cotton gin on, 279, 
280; review of, in U. S., 312-314; 
arguments for, 319; Lincoln and, 
370, 371; Emancipation Procla¬ 
mation and, 371-373; abolished 
by 13th amendment, 386. 

Slaves, “contraband of war,” 371. 

Slidell, Mason and, 360, 361. 

Smith, John, 44,45. 

Smith, Joseph, 317. 

Smithsonian Institution, 452. 

Smuggling, 108, 140. 

Social reforms, 297, 316, 317, 441- 
443. 

Socialists, increase of vote, 457 

Soldiers, billeting of, 198. 

“Sons of Liberty,” 143, 144. 

South, tariff in the, 289, 290, 301, 
302; rushes to arms, 352; popula¬ 
tion at time of Civil War, 353; de¬ 
pendence of, 353, 354; education 
in, 355, 356; military training of, 
357, 358; hard times in, during 
war, 388-390; reconstruction in, 
391-398, 405;the new, 435. 

South America, mediation of, in 
Mexican turmoil, 462; commercial 
relations with, 462. 

South American Colonies, and Mon¬ 
roe Doctrine, 282, 383, 462. 


South Carolina, beginning of, 95; 
early history of, 97-99; nullifica¬ 
tion in, 302, 303; secedes from 
Union, 317, 348. 

South Dakota, admitted to Union, 
428. 

Spain, explorations of, in New 
World, 10-21; colonizes, 18, 25- 
30; wars between, and England, 
30, 39, 40; wars between, and 
Netherlands, 30; extent of colonies 
of, in New World, 111; gets 
Louisiana, 121; relations with, 
204; grants place of deposit at 
New Orleans, 242; cedes Louisiana 
to France. 250; hold of, on Ameri¬ 
can colonies weakens, 281, 282; 
trouble between, and Cuba, 416- 
418; war with U. S., 418-420; 
summary of influence in New 
World, 421. 

Spanish America, 205. 

Speaker, the, 491. 

Specie Circular, 307. 

Speculation, 305-307. 

Spinner, mule, 225. 

Spinning in New England, 225, 226. 

Spinning jenny, 225. 

Spoils System, 300, 301, 409. 

Spotswood, Governor Alexander, of 
Virginia, 116. 

Spotsylvania, battle of, 378 

Squanto, 55 (note). 

Squatter Sovereignty, 329; in Kan¬ 
sas, 341. 

Stagecoach, trarvel by, 127. 

Stamp Act, passed, 141; riots 
caused by, 143; repeal of, 143, 144. 

Stamp Act Congress, 142, 143, 150. 

Standish, Miles, 54. 

Stanton, Secretary of War, 397. 

Stanwix, Fort, 173. 

“Standpatters,” 452, 454. 

Stark, John, 155, 173. 

“ Star-Spangled Banner,” 269 (note). 

“Starving times,” 45. 

States Rights, 303, 304. 

States, first governments formed, 
165, 166; pow r ers of, under Articles 
of Confederation, 167; dates of 
admission, areas and populations 
of, Appendix, xxix. 



lxx 


INDEX 


Steamboat, invention of, 252, 253; 
separates East and West, 275. 

Steel, growth of the use of, 436. 

Stephens, Alexander H., elected 
Vice - President of Confederate 
States, 349. 

Stephenson, George, 295. 

Steuben, Baron, 178. 

Stevens, Thaddeus, 394. 

Stocks, 64. 

Stockton, Commodore, 325. 

Stony Point, 183. 

Stowe, Harriet Beecher, 335. 

Strike, Railway, 1877, 406; railway, 
1894, 414; coal, 448. 

Stuyvesant, Peter, 80, 81. 

Suffrage, manhood, 287; woman’s, 
457. 

Sugar Act, 139. 

Sullivan, General, 180. 

Sumner, Charles, 340, 394. 

Sumter, Fort, 350, 351. 

Sumter, Thomas, 189. 

Superstition, in colonies, 134. 

Supreme Court, position of, 303; 
new Justices of, 453; also 492. 

Surplus, bank, 306. 

Sutter’s mill, 330. 

Swedes in America, 79, 80. 

Swiss in Carolinas, 96. 

Taft, Wm. H., President, 450; im¬ 
portant measures of his adminis¬ 
tration, 450-454, 456, 457, 459, 
460; Appendix, xxviii. 

Talleyrand, 244 (note). 

Taney, Chief Justice, 342. 

Tariff, first, 234; during war of 1812, 
272, 273; of abominations, 289; 
North and South disagree about, 
289, 290, 301, 302; causes nulli¬ 
fication in South Carolina, 303; 
of 1842, 311; McKinley Bill, 411; 
Republican and Democratic ideas 
of, 411, 412, 453, 457; reduction 
of the tariff, 457, 458. See also 
Protection. 

Taxation without representation, 
principle explained, 144, 145. 

Taylor, General, in Mexican War, 
323, 324; President, 329-335. 

Tea Act, 148. 


Tecumseh, war with, 259, 260. 

Telegraph, 356, 357. 

Telephone, 404. 

Tennessee, early settlements, 181; 
admitted to Union, 273; secedes, 
352. 

Tennessee , vessel, 381. 

Tenure of Office Act, 394, 397. 

Territorial expansion, 421, 422. 

Territories, areas and populations 
of, Appendix, xxix. 

Texas, secedes from Mexico, 320, 
321; question of admission to U. S., 
321, 322; annexed, 323; secedes, 
348; readmitted, 398. 

Thames, battle of, 264. 

Thirty Years’ War, 92 (note). 

Thomas, General, 375, 376, 377, 383. 

“Three-fifths Compromise,” 220. 

Ticonderoga, Fort, taken by Am¬ 
herst. 120; by Ethan Allen, 157; 
by Burgoyne, 173. 

Tilden, Samuel J., candidate for 
presidency, 401, 402. 

Tippecanoe, battle of, 260. 

Tobacco, use of, taught Columbus 
by Indians, 11; source of wealth 
by colonies, 48, 93. 

Tobacco Trust, case of, 454. 

Toleration, urged by Roger Wil¬ 
liams, 67; in Maryland, 91; relig¬ 
ious, 201. 

Toleration Act, 91. 

Toronto (York), burned, 267 (note). 

Town, as unit in New England, 60, 
61, 62. 

Townshend Acts, 145. 

Township, 61, 131. 

Trade. See Commerce. 

Trade Commission Bill, the, 459. 

Travel, in colonial times, 126, 127; 
in 1790, 227, 228; by flatboat, 228. 
229, 253; by trails to Far West, 
423-425. 

Treason, Law of, 198. 

Treasury, independent, 308. 

Trent affair, 360, 361. 

Trenton, battle of, 171. 

Trial by jury, 143 (note). 

Trust Problem, 439-441. 

Turks, block routes to East. 5. 



INDEX lxxi 


Turner, Nat., rebellion, 314 (note,. 

Turning point of World War, 479. 

Tweed ring, 401. 

Tyler, John, 310-312. 

“Uncle Tom’s Cabin,” 335. 

Underground railroad, 334, 335. 

Union League, 395. 

Union Party, 385 (note). 

United States, and foreign countries, 
202; demands indemnity from 
China, 460; prestige of, in China, 
460; interference of government 
of, in Mexico, 461; position of, 
among the world powers, 445. 

United States, vessel, 265. 

Utah, Mormons in, 318 (note), 424; 
silver in, 423. 

Utrecht, Treaty of, 115. 

Vaca, Cabeca de. See Cabeca de 
Vaca. 

Vagrancy Laws, 392. 

Valley Forge, army at, 177, 178. 

Van Buren, Martin, President, 307, 
308; candidate, 329. 

Van Rensselaer, 79. 

Velocipede, 404. 

Venice, 5. 

Vera Cruz, captured, 325; American 
sailors seized at, 461. 

Verrazano (ver-atz-ah'no), 30 (map). 

Vesey plot, 314 (note). 

Vespucci, Amerigo, 13, 14, 17. 

Vice-President, provision for elec¬ 
tion of, 247 (note), 490. 

Vicksburg, battle of, 375. 

Victory, Allied, 481. 

Vignaud, 8 (note). 

Villa, rebel leader in Mexico, 461. 

Vincennes, 182. 

Vinland, discovered, 9. 

Virginia, colonization of, 39, 43, 48; 
charter of 1609, 46; House of 
Burgesses in, 47; becomes a per¬ 
manent colony, 49, 50; faithful to 
Charles I, 103; Bacon’s rebellion 
in, 106; westward movement in, 
116; Western land claims of, 215 
(note); secedes, 352; readmitted, 

398. 

Virginia , vessel, 364, 365. 


Virginia, and Kentucky Resolutions 
246. 

Walk-in-the-water, 253. 

War Camp Community Service, 477. 

War of 1812, 261-271. 

War of the Roses, 36. 

War with Spain, 418-421. 

War with Mexico, 323-326. 

War, World, cost of, 482. 

Washington, George, sent by Din- 
widdie as messenger to French, 
117; defeated at Fort Necessity, 
117; and First Continental Con¬ 
gress, 150; commander in chief of 
the Continental Army, 157; char¬ 
acter of, 158; takes Boston, 160, 
161; campaigns in New York, New 
Jersey and Pennsylvania, 168, 
174, 179; and Conway Cabal, 178; 
at Yorktown, 190; and constitu¬ 
tional convention, 217; President, 
231-242; custom of, at inaugura¬ 
tion, revived, 457. 

Washington, City, made U. S. 
capital, 248; burned, 268. 

Washington, State, admitted to 
Union, 428. 

Washington, Treaty of, 399. 

Washington societies, 316. 

Wasp, 264. 

Watauga, settlements on, 181; In¬ 
dian attacks on, 182. 

Wayne, “Mad Anthony,” takes 
Stony Point, 183; at Maumee 

Rapids, 241. 

Weather Bureau, 500. 

Webster, Daniel, debates with 
Hayne, 302, 303; Secretary of 
State, 311. 

Webster-Ashburton Treaty, 311. 

Weights and Measures, 499. 

Wellington, Duke of, 269. 

Welsh, in Pennsylvania, 88, 89. 

Wesley, Charles, 101. 

West Florida, 281 (note). 

West India Company, Dutch, 76. 

West Indies, discovered, 11, 12; 
colonized, 26, 27; colonial trade 
with, 108, 109, 128, 205. 

West Jersey, 83. 

West, land claims, 215; roads to, 




lxxii 


INDEX 


228, 229, 276-278; growth of, in 
years preceding, 1830, 292-294; 
trails to Far, 423, 424; agriculture 
in, 429-431. 

West Virginia, formed, 353; coal 
mined in, 354. 

Westward movement, in 1635, 70; 
in Virginia, 116; later, 180, 181; 
in 1790, 229; after war of, 1812, 
273-276. 

Wethersfield, founded, 70. 

Whigs in Revolution, 155, 156, 183; 
National Republicans take name, 
308. 

Whisky Rebellion, 236. 

White, John, 57. 

White House, burned, 268. 

White Plains, battle of, 170. 

Whitfield, George, 101. 

Whitman, Marcus, 322. 

Whitney, Eli, 227. 

Whittier, John Greenleaf, 318, 356. 

Wilderness, battles of, 378. 

William of Orange, 104, 114. 

Williams, Roger, 66-70. 

Wilmot Proviso, 328. 

Wilson, James, and Constitutional 
Convention, 217. 

Wilson, Woodrow, Governor of New 
Jersey, 456; attitude of, towards 
tariff, 457-458; inauguration of, 
457-458; foreign policy of, 459- 
462; neutrality, declaration of, 


464; quoted, 440-441; re-elected 
President, 1916, 472; at Peace 
Conference, 482; Appendix, xxviii. 

Winchester, General. 263. 

Windsor, founded, 70. 

Winona, Minnesota, Speech of 
President Taft at, 452. 

Winthrop, John, 60, 62. 

Wireless Telegraphy, 444. 

Wisconsin, lumber trade of, 354. 

Wolfe, General, 119, 120, 121. 

Woman’s suffrage, 457. 

Women, work of, for country during 
Great War, 477. 

Women’s rights, 317, 457 (note). 

Wood, General Leonard, acknowl¬ 
edged leader in movement for 
military preparedness, 471. 

World War, cost of, 482. 

Wright, Frances, 317. 

Writs of Assistance, 140, 145. 

Wyoming, admitted to Union, 428. 

Wyoming Valley massacre, 179. 

X. Y. Z. affair, 244. 

York (Toronto), burned, 267 (note). 

York, Duke of, 82. 

Yorktown, battle of, 190. 

Young Men’s Christian Association, 
477. 

Zenger, Peter, trial of, 137. 


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